


Do What it Takes

by Brdazi



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Temporary Amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-16
Updated: 2018-11-20
Packaged: 2019-06-11 05:30:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 52,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15308517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brdazi/pseuds/Brdazi
Summary: Jake and Amy are chasing a perp when Amy gets shot. She hits her head and when she wakes up, she can't remember most of the nine-nine, and Jake takes it as a personal mission to get her to fall in love with him again.





	1. The Fall

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, I'm going to just say that I didn't do much research on police protocols or the medical ins and out of amnesia. I do know that what I'm writing, the kind of amnesia, is usually plot for books or tv shows or movies or whatever and doesn't really happen in real life. So I guess just enjoy this for what it is, please? This is the first time in a long time I've felt like writing, and this is what came out, so I know it's not that good, but I'm happy to just let it happen, and I hope you guys are too! (Oh, and the rating may change, I haven't really decided where I'm going with this yet.)

**Jake**

 

It was the gunshot that initially got his attention, but it was the quiet, “oh,” and the proceeding crash that injected ice into Jake’s veins. To him it was like everything had slowed down, but there was nothing he could do. The perp he and Amy were chasing had wildly thrown his arm back, shooting his weapon without looking when they had reached the top of the stairs. The only thing that hit Jake was the shrapnel from the wall and banister that the bullets had lodged themselves into, but he turned just in time to see Amy get hit square in the chest, and while he knew she was wearing a vest, the bullet couldn’t do that much harm, he hoped, it was the impact that forced her to take a step back into open air. 

Jake threw his arm out to grab her, but it was too late, she stumbled over the step and fell backwards onto the stairs. Her face had a mildly startled look until the back of her head made impact with the edge of a stair, her eyes fluttered closed, and her body resembled a ragdoll that had been tossed aside. Suddenly everything sped up again and went from too slow to fast forward. Acting on impulse, following the training that had been drilled into him, he communicated his location to Rosa, who should be waiting for the perp to run right into the alleyway she was covering, tell her that he was coming her way, and that he had an officer down. 

Blood was dripping down the stairs and Jake hovered over Amy, not sure what to do. He knew a lot of first aid, but suddenly everything had gone out of his head. He scrambled down the stairs, trying to avoid jostling Amy, and tried to let himself work on muscle memory as he watched his wife bleed onto the dirty old wood. Too much or too little time had passed, he couldn’t tell, when uniformed EMTs were nudging him out of the way.

“We’ve got her from here, sir, we need you to get out of the way,” one man said as he pushed Jake to the side. The men rushed around Amy, talking to each other quickly and yelling out words that Jake didn’t quite understand and before he knew it, they were carrying her away, presumably towards an ambulance. 

“Is she going to be okay?” Jake yelled after them, jumping to his feet to follow them, “Please tell me she’s going to be okay.”

“We’re going to do the best we can,” a woman said to him, but to Jake it seemed that the response was automatic, something they just say to people as they try to do their jobs. 

Jake watched helplessly as Amy was lifted into an ambulance and disappeared from view, he knew he wasn’t allowed in the ambulance with her, he knew they would only tell him to step back and let them do their jobs, so it took a lot of self control to stand there and watch as the doors were closed and it drove away, leaving him with more questions than answers.

For a while Jake stared at the corner where the ambulance turned and disappeared from his view. He felt frozen, stuck, and he mentally mapped all that had happened in the past hour. If he had stood just a few inches to the right, if he had let her go up the stairs first, if he was quicker, if, if, if. Scenarios going through his head a mile a minute of all the things he could have done to protect Amy, but he didn’t, and now she was hurt, and all he could think was that it was his fault. The reason she was on this sting was because of him as well, he had pulled her onto the case when he didn’t need to, and now she was hurt. 

“Hey,” Jake snapped his attention to Rosa, “what the hell happened back there?”

“He shot her,” Jake said.

Rosa paused for a moment. “We caught the guy, I’ll bring him in to interrogate. You get to the hospital.”

“But, I have to–” Jake said weakly.

“No,” Rosa said, “get to the hospital.” 

Jake nodded slowly, until Rosa nudged his arm, and he broke out into a run. When he looked back at that moment, he couldn’t tell how he had gotten to the hospital or how long it had taken, everything was a blur to him. He had complete clarity as he chased the guy with Amy just behind him, and then everything shattered around him. 

Hospitals were one of Jake’s least favorite places, they always smelled of bleach or disinfectant, they were always weirdly bright, and the mix of emotions in the buildings were disorienting. He glanced over to a family huddled in the corner and wondered what they were there for, the death of a family member, or possibly a birth, either way, there was anxious energy drifting off of them, which didn’t help with Jake’s own feelings. The nurse at the desk looked harried and tired, a part of Jake felt bad for disrupting her, but he needed to get information.

“Hi,” he said tentatively, and tried to smile, but he was sure his face didn’t quite show it. “I’m uh, I’m looking for a patient.”

“Their name?”

“Amy Peralta,” Jake said, and as usual he felt the surge of emotion from when Amy agreed to take his name. He had told her that he was fine with her keeping her name, or hyphenating their names, but she had agreed to legally take his name and he couldn’t explain the happiness when she told him that. At work she was still Amy Santiago, because they wanted to avoid confusion there, her badge still said Santiago, but her licence and every other legal document said Peralta. 

The nurse typed at her computer, frowning slightly, and Jake tapped his foot, willing her to go faster, but knew that pushing the woman wasn’t going to help, none of this was her fault, and she was just trying to do her job. She finally found the information he was looking for.

“Head trauma,” she listed off, “and bruised ribs. What’s your relation to the patient?”

“I’m her husband,” Jake said, anxiety taking over, he just wanted to see Amy, see that she was alright. He wanted her to hold his hand and tell him he was being overbearing again and that it was just a scratch. He wanted her to shake her head slightly at him, tell him she was going to be okay and that they were going to go home tonight and have a restful night in.

The nurse nodded absently and listed off a floor and a room, and then directed him to an elevator. He thanked her and rushed through the visitor pass information she had shoved in front of him before he could go into the elevator. He was sure that no one could actually read the scribbles he had put on the pass, but it looked like the nurse was either too sympathetic, or simply didn’t care anymore, which was fine by him either way. 

Another thing that Jake hated about hospitals was that they always seemed like mazes to him. All the hallways looked the same, all the people were wearing similar things, and everyone seemed like they were in too much of a rush. He hesitated when he had reached the right floor, not sure where he was supposed to go now, until he spotted another desk. 

Jake walked up to the nurse at this desk and once again gave out Amy’s name and who he was, this time the nurse asked him to wait a moment while he got the doctor. Jake figited, he pulled at the plastic edge of the desk and picked off pieces of it, waiting once again for someone to help him. The nurse came back with a woman wearing dark rimmed glasses and even darker bags under her eyes. 

“Mr. Peralta?” the woman asked and held out her hand. Jake automatically took it, nodded, and waited for her to continue. “My name is Dr. Wrick, I was just in with your wife. She’s still not conscious, so we don’t know the extent of her head injury, but the vest did its job, and the bruising on her ribs is minimal.” Jake nodded again, not sure how to respond, and hoped that Dr. Wrick had more information for him. “From what we can tell so far, she should be fine, though.” Jake sighed heavily, not sure when he had breathed in that much. “You may sit with her, if you like.” Jake nodded again and let the doctor lead him to a room that was identical to every other one they passed. She gestured him into the room and he thanked her quietly before directing all of his attention to Amy. She looked peaceful, as if she were sleeping, and all Jake wanted was for her to open her eyes. He pulled up one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs as close as he could to the bed and sat down. He picked up her limp hand and squeezed it slightly before kissing the back of her hand. “She’s going to wake up soon,” he told himself, “she’s going to wake up soon and it’s all going to be fine.”

After a few minutes of just sitting and staring at Amy, Jake pulled out his phone, he figured it was his responsibility to let her parents know what happened to her, even if her father terrified him. He smiled slightly at the barrage of phone calls and texts from his coworkers, most of them from Charles. One from Holt telling him to keep him updated; one from Terry, reassuring him that everything was going to be fine and to let him know that he and Amy could both have at least tomorrow off; one from Rosa, telling him that she almost made the perp wet himself before he confessed everything and the proceeded to give up names of some of the guys that got away.  

The phone call with Amy’s parents went better than Jake hoped it would, mainly because it was her mother that had picked up the phone, and he was told that they were on their way to see her. It was when he was trying to respond to Charles to tell him to calm down that Jake felt Amy’s hand shift in his, he glanced up to see her staring at him with a slightly confused look on her face. 

“Ames,” Jake sighed and squeezed her hand. She pulled her hand away from his and he frowned at her.

“Who are you?” Amy said quickly, Jake could hear the panic rising in her voice. 

“It’s me,” Jake said, “It’s Jake.” Amy’s brows furrowed, and Jake’s heart dropped. 


	2. The Confusion of Waking Up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, normally when I write regularly, I tend to upload on Fridays, but I won't be able to upload tomorrow, so I'm uploading tonight. I also have the next few chapters already written and the one after planned out, so, so far it looks like you guys will get regular content! (You know, if you actually want to read this, which I majorly appreciate by the way, you guys are awesome!)

**Amy**

 

At first the only thing she could register was that her head hurt, she kept her eyes closed and hoped that the throbbing in the back of her skull would subside. When it wouldn’t, she tried to slowly open her eyes, but the light was too much to handle. She took note of how her ribs were throbbing, but nothing too bad, and how she could feel a warm hand pressed into her own. She frowned for a moment and forced herself to open her eyes. There was a man sitting next to her, he was absentmindedly rubbing his thumb along her knuckles as he smiled at his phone, and typed something out with the other hand. He looked vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t seem to place him from somewhere in her life. 

He glanced up at her and a soft smile spread across his face, and she couldn’t help but think that he looked cute and she liked the way he smiled at her. “Ames,” he whispered and squeezed her hand, which reminded her that her hand was still in his, and then pulled away from him. His cute smile quickly turned to confusion.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“It’s me,” confusion turned to devastation, “it’s Jake.”

She frowned and a part of her wished he would just leave her room, she was confused, and she could feel the panic rising up in her. This man was clearly in the wrong place, she didn’t know him, so he couldn’t know her. And yet he knew her name, or at least, a nickname that she had never heard anyone give her before. She glanced around the room, spotted the button to call the nurse and dove for it. 

Jake reached out to her, but seemed to think better of it and pulled away. 

“No,” Amy said, “I don’t know you, I think you should leave.”

“But…” Jake started and let himself trail off. He stared at her, and she stared back, guarded and afraid. “You know me,” he whispered.

Something seemed to click in her head for a moment. “From the nine-nine,” she said, without really meaning to, and Jake nodded enthusiastically. “We met the other day.” His eyes went wide. “We met and that other man, Charles—”

The nurse walked in and looked back and forth between the couple. “Is everything alright?” he asked. “I’m glad to see you’re awake,” he directed at Amy, “let me call the doctor for you, she can help clear things up.”

“Wait,” Jake called out and followed the nurse and glanced back at Amy before he walked out of the room. She took a deep breath and tried to rationalize why she was in the hospital and why a man she had just met was sitting next to her. They could have been working on a case and something had happened, but that didn’t exactly explain why the hospital had let him sit with her. He could have pulled the “I’m a police officer” card, and she frowned at how unethical that would be. She remembered meeting a lot of people the previous day, going to sleep, and then nothing. 

After a few more minutes of trying to think through everything, Amy’s head started to hurt even more than it had done when she woke up. She gingerly reached her hand up to her hair only to pull away quickly when brushing her hand against her head shot a bolt of pain through her. She was grimacing when a well dressed woman wearing a doctor’s coat walked in with Jake trailing behind her.

“Hi,” the doctor seemed to hesitate for a moment, “Amy, I’m Dr. Wrick, how are you feeling?”

“My head hurts,” Amy said stupidly.

“That’s to be expected,” the doctor smiled at her. “What’s the last thing you remember?”

“I started at a new precinct, yesterday I think, and I went to bed. I don’t remember anything after that,” Amy said. She glanced up at Jake, who looked like he was struggling to hold himself back from saying something as he shifted his weight back and forth and wrung his hands together. He kept going back to the wedding band on his finger and twisting it around, it seemed to be a nervous habit, but she couldn’t recall him being married, especially not if Charles, another detective at the precinct had immediately said he could hear wedding bells between her and Jake. She cringed at the memory. From the bits and pieces she could put together, she was sure that Jake was immature and definitely not her type. 

Jake was staring at the ground, he had gone very pale and for a moment Amy was worried he was about to pass out. The doctor glanced at him and he took a deep shuddering breath, but didn’t look away from the ground.

“You’ve hit your head pretty hard,” Dr. Wrick said, “I would like to do a few cognitive tests with you, Amy.”

Amy nodded and stared at the doctor, she didn’t understand why Jake was still in the room, or why the doctor was letting him stay there. “What happened?” This question she directed at Jake, if he was here when she woke up, she reasoned that he must feel at least partially responsible for what happened.

“You, uh,” Jake glanced at the doctor, she nodded slightly, “we were chasing a perp, he fired his gun behind him, you got hit, the vest stopped the bullet from doing too much damage, but you lost your balance and fell backwards onto the stairs we had just run up.”

Amy nodded slightly, that explained the pain in chest and the back of her head. “Did we catch the guy?”

Jake smiled slightly, “Rosa did, I was busy trying to make sure you were okay.”

For a moment Amy stared blankly at Jake, she was sure Rosa was a name she was supposed to know, one of the many people she had met. “Scary looking woman with curly hair?” Amy asked when her brain finally provided an image, and Jake nodded slightly.

“Mr. Peralta,” the doctor said, “I’m going to ask you to wait outside while I run a few simple tests.” 

He nodded, but hesitated at the door, as if he were afraid to leave. Dr. Wrick gave him a gentle nudge out the door and closed it behind him. She took a deep breath and turned back to Amy with a slightly plastered on smile. From what Amy could tell, the doctor looked tired, as if this were nearing the end of her shift and she needed a few days off to recuperate. 

After the doctor ran Amy through some simple tests, such as following her fingertip with her eyes, the doctor went quiet for a moment. “There are a lot of arguments on the best way to tell a patient this, but I usually prefer the direct approach,” she said, and Amy frowned in confusion. “I think you’ve lost several years of memory, especially from your reaction to Mr. Peralta.” Amy frowned even deeper, there was no way she had lost years of memory, she told herself, no way. A day maybe, a couple of hours if she did hit her head as hard as they say she did. But she couldn’t have lost years, that didn’t make sense, it didn’t happen like that. Even though the doctor had mentioned Jake as someone she should have had a different reaction to, she decided to gloss over that bit of information. 

“That can’t be,” Amy said slowly, “that doesn’t make sense.”

“On the plus side,” the doctor continued, “with rare cases like this one, usually the patient will recall most of their memories over time, possibly not all of them, but generally everything will come back to you, you just have to be patient with yourself. I’ll let Mr. Peralta explain what he can to you, he’s been very anxious to see you.”

“Why?” Amy couldn’t help but blurt out.

Dr. Wrick hesitated by the door before she answered, “He’s your husband. Some of your personal items are on the table next to you.” She left before Amy could ask any more questions. She felt dumbstruck, there was no way that she had married a man who used orange soda as a substitute for milk in his cereal. She wasn’t sure why that was the first thing she thought of, but once again, she decided to put the thought aside. The table next to her was very basic and had some items in a plastic bag. Amy figured she had a very short time before Jake came back into the room, and she wanted to try to compose herself before he came back. But being made aware of the little bag on the table had made things worse to her, because she could stop staring at two little rings inside it, one, a very simple engagement ring, and the other a plain wedding band, one she was loathe to admit looked very similar to the one Jake had been fidgeting with. 

It seemed eons before the door slowly opened again, and Jake hesitated in the threshold. He gently knocked on the door, even though he already had her attention. “Is it okay if I come in?” he asked. For a brief moment Amy thought of telling him no, asking him to leave and making it clear that there was no way she was romantically involved with him, but that’s not what she did. She shrugged slightly and Jake hesitated again before shutting the door behind him and taking the seat he was sitting in when she woke up. He reached towards her, but then seemed to think better of it, and pulled his hand back again. It looked like muscle memory, something he had done so many times before that stopping himself seemed painful for him. 

“So,” Jake started, “the doc told me about your memory loss… and that she told you we’re married.” He was staring at the corner of the bed, as if he was worried to look at her. 

“That’s got to be some kind of joke, right?” Amy asked before she could stop herself. Jake’s eyes snapped to hers and all she felt was guilt because of the look of devastation on his face, he looked away quickly and went back to staring at the corner of the bed.

“Um,” Jake shook his head. “No, no joke. Uh, I guess I can answer questions you have, or I can try.” He seemed to be trying to gloss over their marriage, get her to concentrate on something else, but Amy wasn’t having that.

“What do you mean ‘no joke?’” She asked. Jake just shrugged, so Amy waited. It was like interrogating someone, stay silent long enough, and they’ll get uncomfortable, they’ll want to say something, it’s human nature.

“I know what you’re doing,” Jake said and gave her a small smile, “I know how to interrogate too.”

“If your interrogations are anything like your desk and your paperwork, I’m sure it’s abysmal,” Amy said before thinking, although somehow it was the right thing to say, because Jake started to laugh.

“Amy,” Jake said and reached his hand towards hers, she automatically pulled away and once again, the sad look on Jake’s face made her uncomfortable. Just as she was about to start asking him actual questions, she heard a commotion outside the door. Jake just sighed and stared at the door, waiting. A few seconds later it swung open and her parents came marching in, her father hovered over her, glaring at Jake, while her mother rushed over and grabbed her hand. Her mom was asking so many questions, varying from how she’s feeling to what happened to did she really forget everything? It was too much for Amy to process all at once, and she was stuck just staring at her mother as she fussed. 

Jake cleared his throat and stood up, “I’ll give you guys some time then.” Jake nodded slightly at Amy’s father as he walked out of the room and gently shut the door behind him.

“I’m married to him,” Amy said over her mother, effectively getting her to stop talking and listen. “Him? Why?”

“I don’t know,” her father said.

“Victor!” her mother scolded. “He makes you happy.”

Amy scrunched up her nose, “How?” Her father looked like he was keeping himself from saying something else, so Amy decided not to push it. She had an intense feeling in her gut to defend Jake to her father, to talk about all the good things about him, but she pushed that feeling away for now. “What year is it?” she asked quickly, “The doctor says I’m missing years.”

“2018,” her mother responded. “The doctor says it should all come back to you eventually.”

“What if it doesn’t?” Amy asked, finally succumbing to her worst fears, something she couldn’t just organize away because it was something she didn’t have control over. What if she was stuck in a marriage she didn’t know anything about, and didn’t really want either, with friends whose names she couldn’t remember, and a career path that she's lost track of. 

“We’re going to help you,” her mother rubbed her arm comfortingly. “We’re all here for you, your family and friends are going to help you. The doctor says you can ask questions, and that that might help jog your memory.”

After a few moments of deliberating with herself, not sure if it was a good idea or not, Amy swung around, and stood up out of the bed. Her vision went fuzzy for a moment and her mother grabbed her arm to help steady her. “I need to take a walk,” Amy said. She pushed past her parents and out into the hallway, fully intending to walk away until she needed to ask someone to find her way back again, until she saw Jake. He was sitting on the floor across from her door with his knees pulled to his chest and his face buried in his hands. When he looked up, he scrambled to stand up, but Amy pushed him back down and sat next to him. 

“What if my memories don’t come back?” she asked, feeling very uncomfortable admitting her fears to someone who may as well be a stranger to her. 

“We’ll make new ones,” Jake answers immediately. 

Amy hesitates voicing another one of her thoughts, she’s not sure she categorizes it as a fear, at least for herself, she realizes it may be a fear for Jake. “And what if I don’t love you after all, what if this, us, doesn’t work out?” She forces herself to look at him, to watch as the pained expression crosses his face and turns into a sad smile.

“Then we’ll deal with that if we have to,” Jake said as he traced the tiles on the floor. “But,” he said, with a forced cheery tone, “if I can make you fall in love with me once, I can do it again. I told you on our first date you weren’t allowed to fall in love with me, and this is where we ended up, so I think the odds are in my favor.”

“I’m not sure if I want to concentrate on the arrogance, or on the fact that on a first date you told me to not like you,” Amy said. 

Jake chucked, and since the first smile she saw on his face, he gave her a genuine smile. “I guess that’s a bit of a long story, basically, you lost a bet.”

“As far as I’m concerned, this isn’t actually looking very promising for you,” Amy said.

“Challenge accepted,” Jake said, “operation make Amy Santiago fall in love with me again is a go.” Amy rolled her eyes, but found herself smiling at him anyway. 


	3. Going Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was barely edited... I hope it's okay.

**Jake**

 

Amy was smiling at him and Jake was on an emotional rollercoaster. He could do this, he knew that no matter what, if he had lost his memories, he would always end up back with Amy. A part of him felt that in any lifetime in any universe, he wound up with Amy, and he had to hope that that worked the other way around as well. While the doctor had told him that in all probability, Amy would get most if not all of her memories back, but Amy’s comment on if she wouldn’t love him afterwards anyway struck a chord with him. It was a thought he refused to acknowledge until Amy had brought it up.

They were sitting in silence now, and Jake had the overwhelming urge to put his arm around her and pull her into his side, but he knew he couldn’t do that, he had to respect her boundaries, and that seemed to include him not touching her. He glanced up when her parents walked out of the room and saw them both sitting on the floor. Jake shied away from the glare her father was giving him, and stood up, he offered a hand to Amy to help her up too, but she just pushed away from him and stood up on her own. Jake let his hand fall limply to his side.

“I’m uh,” Jake started, glancing around at each of the Santiago’s, “I’m going to go ask the nurse what’s going to happen now.” He hurried away before any of them could say anything and walked back to the desk where the nurse sat. He took a few deep breaths while the nurse stared at him.

“I know this must be difficult for you, Mr. Peralta,” the nurse said. “Give it time. Give her time.”

Jake nodded. He felt he had been very quiet, for him at least, so far. This was one of the few times when he found himself not knowing what to say, and not having a joke on hand to try and push away his own awkwardness. “So, what now?” Jake asked.

“Well, we’re going to keep her overnight for observation,” the nurse said, “and in all likelihood she can go home tomorrow.”

“Right,” Jake said, “thanks.” He turned around to find Mrs. Santiago standing behind him.

“She’s very confused right now,” she said.

“Yeah,” Jake replied, “I don’t blame her. I would be confused too. But, if I woke up with no memories and found that Amy was my wife, I’d think it was a joke because it was too good to be true. She thinks it’s a joke because she thinks there’s no way that she could love me.” 

“She does, though,” Mrs. Santiago said. “She loves you and she’ll remember it sooner or later.” She put a comforting hand on his arm and led him to one of the few chairs that were by the nurse’s desk.

“What if she doesn’t?” Jake whispered. He was never usually this close with Amy’s mom, but it felt good to talk to someone.

“She will,” she said, with no hesitation, which made Jake feel better. “Victor plays the overprotective father, and on the outside he makes it seem that he doesn’t like you and doesn’t understand why she chose you, but he knows that you are who makes her happy. It’s her happiness that counts, and I know this must be hard for you, but you will continue to make her happy because that’s what you do.” 

“Sappy,” Jake said, and instantly regretted it, now was not the time for remarks like that, but Mrs. Santiago just smiled at him. “The nurse says she can probably go home tomorrow.” She waited for him to continue. “Where is home for her? We both live in her apartment now, and I’m sure it’s the same one she had back then, but she doesn’t know that I live there too now. It’s going to be very different to her.”

“She’s welcome to stay with us if that would make her more comfortable,” Mrs. Santiago said. It wasn’t the response Jake wanted, but he knew it was the most logical one.

“Or I can see if Charles will let me crash at his place for a bit,” Jake said. “I’m sure he’ll be fine with it.” It didn’t even cross his mind to try and live in his own home, Amy would probably be uncomfortable with him there, and the last thing he wanted was to make her uncomfortable. They sat in silence for a while until Jake abruptly stood up. “We should let her know what the nurse said.” Mrs. Santiago nodded and followed him back down the hall. 

Amy wasn’t in the hallway anymore, so Jake assumed she was back in her room with her father. When he got closer he could hear them talking, and he didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but what he heard made him stop dead. 

“I wish I could remember all these people,” Amy said. “All I have are a few names and maybe a few faces to match, but that’s only because I thought I met them yesterday.”

“Don’t let it worry you,” her father said, “I know how you get. Don’t let this work you up into a panic, you’re going to be able to go back to work in while and everything will come back to you.”

“And Jake,” Amy said, “all I remember of him is that he’s obnoxious and I don’t understand how he became a detective.” Her father didn’t say anything. “How am I supposed to be with a man I don’t know.”

“You don’t have to be if you don’t want to be.”

“But at this point there must be a lot of legal documents involved, if I am married to him.”

Jake was frozen at the door, and if it wasn’t for Mrs. Santiago knocking on the door and nudging Jake into the room, he wasn’t sure he would ever move again. Ice had encircled his heart and pumped through his veins, and his stomach was churning so much he felt like he was going to vomit right then and there. He stared the floor again, he seemed to be avoiding a lot of eye contact recently. “The nurse says they’re going to keep you overnight for observation, but you should be able to go home tomorrow.”

“Home,” Amy said slowly, “With you?”

Jake shrugged, “If you want. But uh, I’m sure you can stay with your parents, or I can ask Charles if I can crash at his place.”

“He would love that,” Amy said, “he would call it a sleepover.” Amy seemed a little confused at her own response, but Jake took it as a positive sign that she knew that much about Charles.

“He probably would,” Jake said. “So, you have options, whatever makes you most comfortable is fine.” Amy stared at him and Jake once again felt the need to take her hand, to reassure her in some way, but he forced himself to stay where he was. 

“I’m tired,” Amy announced, but Jake was sure it was more that she needed him to leave, she wanted to think without his presence there, and he understood. “I think I’m going to go to sleep for now.”

“We’ll go as well, then,” Mrs. Santiago said, and grabbed her husband’s hand. “You call us if you need anything, both of you.” She shot Jake a significant look, and he felt a surge of gratitude for Amy’s mom. He was sure that Amy’s family didn’t like him that much, but the fact that she knew he was hurting, that he might need support and she was willing to give it meant a lot to him. 

Jake knew that was his queue to leave, but he found himself nervous to leave Amy in the hospital. “Okay,” Jake said. “Okay, I’ll go too.” They all walked out together and Jake glanced back at Amy, she was still staring at him, but not in a way that Jake thought was good. He tried to smile at her as he closed the door, but he was sure it looked more like a grimace. As they passed the nurse’s desk, Jake paused and found himself hovering by the seats there. The Santiago’s looked questioningly at him. “I’ll stay out here, just for a while. Just in case she wants to talk to me.” He shrugged a little, he knew he was being hopeful, he knew that she probably would not want to talk to him, that he was possibly the last person she wanted to talk to, but he found that he couldn’t bear to leave her. 

Jake sat motionless for hours, which was probably some kind of record for him. He watched people come and go, most of them wearing scrubs, and he invented stories for them to keep himself occupied. Word travels fast in the nine-nine, and after a while Jake had another barrage of texts and phone calls from his coworkers. He didn’t answer any of the phone calls, and he didn’t know how to respond to any of the texts. Most of them trying to reassure him in some way that everything would go back to normal, but Jake was terrified of the possibility that it wouldn’t. He was almost grateful when his phone died, because that meant he had an excuse for not responding to any of them. 

Light was streaming in through the window, and the next thing Jake knew, it wasn’t. The nurse was shaking him awake and Jake blinked up blearily at him. “Sorry,” Jake mumbled, “do you need me to leave?”

“No,” the nurse responded and then pointed behind him to a woman now sitting at the desk, “my shift is over, I just wanted to let you know that so far your wife is doing fine, and you’re welcome to stay here if you need.”

“Thanks,” Jake said. The nurse smiled at him and walked away, leaving Jake feeling empty again. He wished he could go back to sleep, where this day hadn’t happened and he and Amy were laying in bed, her working on today’s crossword puzzle and him playing games on his phone. His neck and back were aching, but he didn’t get up from the chair, and he resumed making up stories for the people that passed by. He didn’t realize when he had fallen asleep again, and was being shaken awake, this time by another new nurse.

“I was told you’re Mr. Peralta?” Jake nodded. “We’re sending your wife home if you want to go help her with her things.”

Jake knew she wouldn’t need any help because the only things she had was what was on her. The short walk to her room seemed to take both too short and too long a time. Jake wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do, or how he was supposed to act now, he supposed he should just be himself, but so far that wasn’t really who he was being. He was too stressed out about everything and how fast it was all happening to make his usual jokes, and he felt an emptiness at not being able to hold Amy’s hand for support, not being able to turn to her for help. The door was shut, so he knocked on it and waited. Muffled sounds came through the door and then a small “come in.”

“Hey,” Jake said as he opened the door. Amy whipped around to look at him, she had put on the same clothes she was wearing the previous day. “Shit, I should’ve gone home and gotten you something else to wear.”

“It’s fine,” Amy said and shook her head. “The doctor told me you stayed here all night.” Jake flushed and shrugged. “Why?”

She looked like she was willing to wait forever for his answer, and he didn’t want to lie to her, but he also didn’t want to seem like he was pushing her into anything. “I just didn’t want to leave you,” Jake mumbled and forced himself to look at her. 

“Why?”

“I thought that was obvious,” Jake said, trying to make a joke of it, but she kept staring at him. He felt like he had been pulled back into who he was several years ago, the guy who could never talk about emotions and was terrified to say “I love you,” but this time it was for different reasons. Once again, though, Amy was waiting for Jake’s response. “I love you,” he said, and hoped it wouldn’t push her away. Her eyes widened slightly and she turned away from him. He noticed that she hadn’t put her rings back on, but the bag with her personal stuff was gone, so she must have done something with them. Jake wanted to ask her about it, but also knew that he shouldn’t. “So, anyway,” Jake wracked his brain to try and change the subject to something less difficult, “the nurse says you can go home now, and uh, I can still answer any questions you have. Also, do you know what you want to do, I mean, where you want to go? I haven’t called Charles yet, but as I said, I know he’ll be fine with me staying there.” He forced himself to stop talking when he realized he was rambling. 

“Oh,” Amy said, “I uh… I want to go home, but will you come with me?”

“Yes,” Jake said a bit too quickly, “yeah, that’s fine. Uh, you can change your mind too, you know, if you want.” Jake mentally slapped himself. Amy was nodding as she looked around the room, probably to make sure that she had everything.

“Do you mind while I get all the hospital paperwork?” Amy asked.

“Of course not,” Jake smiled and rolled his eyes a little. “You wouldn’t be you unless you got all the paperwork you could.” She bristled a little, and Jake realized that she wasn’t sure if he was mocking her or not. This was their repertoire, he would say something mocking in jest, she would shoot something back at him, they would both smile, but Amy’s silence in response made him feel uncomfortable. “I didn’t mean it like—”

“It’s fine,” Amy said. She walked past him and Jake stood there for a moment, every little mistake he made had made him feel like he had ruined everything. Every wrong move led to Amy leaving him, and he knew he wouldn’t try to stop her. He wanted her to be happy, and if it wasn’t with him, he would accept that. He felt like he had years ago when he had told Rosa that he couldn’t tell other guys not to ask out Amy just because he didn’t have the courage to do it himself. 

He waited as she got all the paperwork that she wanted and talked some more with the nurse, Jake smiled because he knew Amy Santiago was nothing if not thorough. When she turned to face him, they walked over to the elevator and it was only moments before the doors opened. Jake felt uncomfortable, but he was sure Amy felt worse. He kept glancing over at her, and he had the sneaking suspicion that she was doing the same to him.

“You’re quiet,” she said as the doors opened again on the ground floor. 

“Yeah,” Jake agreed.

“You’re not usually quiet.”

“No.”

“Stop,” Amy said as they walked out of the hospital, she turned to him, and he was shocked to see she looked angry. “Stop doing that, stop treating me like I’m going to snap or something, because if you keep doing that, I will. Please, Jake, I’m trying to believe you, I’m trying to get to grips with this, but I can’t do that if you’re treating me with kid gloves. I need you to stop being weird so I can do this.”

Jake paused for a moment. “I need you to stop being weird so I can do this, title of your sex tape.” 

Amy blinked at him and then turned to walk away. “I guess I literally asked for that,” she said as he fell into step with her. He smiled and forced his hands into his pockets so he wouldn’t be inclined to take her hand again. 

Their conversation was stilted and slightly awkward on the subway back to their apartment, and it was about nothing as well. Jake wanted her to ask questions about her life, about their life, but instead she talked about the hospital food and how she hoped her ribs and head would stop hurting soon. And while Jake was more than willing to talk about those topics, he wanted to talk about more with her. 

“We live in my apartment?” Amy asked as they neared her building.

“Yeah, I moved in with you a little over a year ago.”

“Oh.”

“Do you want me to elaborate on that or…”

“I don’t know.”

“Okay,” Jake said, “well, tell me to stop when you want me to, I guess. We made a bet about who had to move into whose apartment, and whoever caught the most runaway convicts won and got to keep their apartment. We were tied down to the last guy, and then I let you win because I realized that you being happy meant more to me than keeping my crappy apartment. I also finally threw out that awful towel after you tried to burn it, but it wouldn’t light.”

“Wait,” Amy stopped him as she opened the door to the building. “First, you let me win, or I actually won? And the towel wouldn’t catch fire?”

“We would have tied,” Jake said, “we were reading him his Miranda Rights at the same time. And yeah, it wouldn’t catch fire because it never dried, in retrospect, it was really gross.”

“You think?” Amy asked with a disgusted look on her face.

“You trained me well,” Jake said. “I put the toilet seat down and everything.”  

Amy gave him a look, but he knew she was smiling when she turned away. This, he thought, this is starting to feel more normal. As usual, Amy walked past the elevator, opting for the stairs because she said it was good exercise. Jake hesitated for a moment, but then remembered what she said about treating her like he normally would.

“Why the stairs, Ames, why do you do this to me every time?”

“You can take the elevator,” she snapped at him, but when she faced him, she saw he was smiling.

“I know,” Jake said and waited for her to keep going up the stairs. “Any war flashbacks yet? We were going up stairs when you fell, if anything stairs should have traumatized you for life and you should never want to walk up them ever again. As your dutiful husband I will take the sacrifice and go in the elevator with you, always.”

“This sounds more like you,” Amy said as she glanced back at him before she opened the door to her floor. “Maybe a little forced, but more you.”

Jake grimaced when she turned back around. He was forcing himself a little, he was still worried about how she would react, a part of him felt like she was threatening divorce at every turn. “You like it,” he said, this time, though, it was automatic.

“For some reason, I do,” Amy said as she opened the door to the apartment. Jake smiled and almost walked right into her when she didn’t actually enter the room. She hesitated for a moment before she walked in and looked around the room. 

“You’re taking all of this really well so far,” Jake said. Thinking back on it, he was surprised at how easily she had agreed to go home with him, how she had asked him to just be himself with her, and he suddenly realized that while that gave him hope, while it made him happy, something was off about it. “What else did the doctor say to you?”

On one of the tables pushed against the far wall were pictures of Jake and Amy’s life together, anywhere from them just sitting next to each other, to the photo of them when they beat the Vulture, and even a creep shot Charles took of them kissing once. Amy picked up the one that had been taken recently, one that Jake didn’t really like, but Amy had insisted on framing. She was looking directly at the camera with a huge smile on her face, and her arm wrapped around Jake’s shoulders, while Jake wasn’t smiling, he was just looking at her, he could see the adoration in his own face in the photo, and he wasn’t sure what it was about it that he didn’t like, maybe he still wasn’t great with emotions. And he wondered what Amy saw when she looked at the photo. Did she see a life she wished she could remember, or did she see a couple that had nothing to do with her except they had their faces? Was it scary or reassuring to her? Did this help convince her that they were in a loving relationship, or did it help convince her that she needed to leave before she was stuck with a man who loved a girl in a photo she couldn’t remember being? 

“They told me to try,” Amy said and put the photo back down. “They told me to try to be myself, that the memories would come back and that it was okay to lean on my friends and family. My father told me to trust you.” The last sentence she said hesitantly, and like Amy had done before, Jake waited silently for her to continue. “He told me that I love you.” Jake’s heart leapt, but he forced it back down, she was stating facts, not admitting feelings. “He told me that you love me, that no matter what, you want what’s best for me.”

“I do,” Jake whispered, he felt himself shrugging back on the persona that wasn’t truly him, the one who walked around Amy as if she were fragile even though he knew she was tougher than that. 

“I don’t think I can do this,” Amy said, and Jake could hear her panic, “I can’t do this, I can’t be here with you.”


	4. Familiar and Unfamiliar

**Amy**

 

“I don’t think I can do this. I can’t do this, I can’t be here with you,” Amy said. She had tried. She had agreed to go home with him, she tried to talk to him and told him to just be himself with her, but she couldn’t stop the fear building up in her as she willingly walked into an apartment with a man she barely knew. She couldn’t stop the feeling that she didn’t want to be here, that all she wanted was to curl up in her own bed and read a book until she fell asleep again. There was a problem with that now, though, her room wasn’t hers anymore, it was theirs, and if she stayed here, every turn she made would remind her that time had passed without her, or at least, she couldn’t remember it. Although she felt like she couldn’t call her parents and ask to stay with them, especially after her father told her to trust this man, someone whom her father didn’t seem to like all that much. A quiet voice in the back of her head said, “what if he doesn’t like him because you’re married to him? What if he doesn’t like him just because he still doesn’t want to let his daughter go?”

“Okay,” Jake said and put his hands up in a “calm down” motion, “Okay, that’s okay. Do you want to call your parents or do you want me to call Charles? Tell me what you want me to do, Ames, tell me how to help.” He sounded a little desperate, but Amy could still tell that he meant it, that he just wanted to help her. “Just tell me what you need me to do.” He took a step towards her and she forced herself to not take a step back. 

Suddenly his hands were on her shoulders, and she felt herself instantly relax, and she couldn’t decide if she liked her reaction, or hated it. She automatically reached up to grab his arms, and she had the tugging feeling that they had done this before, that she had panicked about something, and he had tried to calm her. She didn’t know if she hated or loved that while she couldn’t really remember the man standing in front of her, her body did. For the first time since she woke up, he was touching her and was close enough to smell his leather jacket and whatever remnants of his body wash. She had the overwhelming urge to wrap her arms around his waist and tuck her face into the crook of his neck. She hesitated, not sure if she should act on it, but it seemed she had waited too long, and couldn’t help but feel a loss when he pulled away.

“I’m sorry,” Jake said, “I didn’t meant to. I mean, I did, but I wasn’t thinking. I do that a lot, I don’t think things through.” He kept talking and Amy let his mumbling turn into background noise to her. 

“It’s okay,” she said over him, “thanks, I guess.”

Silence hung in the air between them, and Amy didn’t know what to say, and she could see Jake struggling for words as well. He cleared his throat and took a deep breath. “So, what is it you want me to do? How do I make this as easy as possible for you?”

There was silence again, and this time Amy knew she was the one who had to break it. “I don’t know, I just want to take a shower and get out of these clothes.” Jake nodded.

“How about I just go to Charles’ place? It’s not to far from here, and if you want me to come back, I can in just minutes,” Jake said. 

“I’m not sure I feel comfortable alone here.”

“Why not? It was your home before it was mine.”

“But that’s just the thing,” Amy said, exasperated, “it’s your home now too, and I feel like I’d be invading your privacy.”

Jake laughed, that wasn’t the reaction Amy was expecting, so she just waited. She waited for him to say something like, “then just don’t go through my stuff,” or, “okay, just stick to what you are comfortable with.” She did not expect him to laugh like that.

“Ames,” Jake said, “you can snoop through whatever you want. I don’t keep any secrets from you, and you can’t invade my privacy in any way because that’s not how I think about it. I don’t care about what you go through in our home, fuck, maybe something will help you remember something. If you’d like to just look around the apartment, that’s fine, and if you want me here or if you want me to leave while you do it, either way I don’t care. You go through my stuff anyway, you call it ‘cleaning.’” Jake smiled at her. “Seriously, whatever is fine.”

“I don’t know,” Amy said. “I don’t think I’d like you watching me as I go through your stuff.” She hesitated, and he waited. “I’m just going to take a shower.”

Amy turned on her heel and walked to where she knew the bathroom was, she tried not to look at Jake as she shut the door behind her. When she turned back around to look at the room, she found that even this was different. The sink had an extra toothbrush, there were more towels, the shower curtain was new, things that were stuffed on the shelves behind the mirror were not all hers, and there were a lot more bottles in the shower. Amy recognised her own shampoo and conditioner, and what she assumed must be Jake’s. After a moment of staring, Amy forced herself to go through the motions of turning the shower on, and for a moment she could hear movement on the other side of the wall, where the bedroom was. Jake must have been doing something in there. She took a deep breath and let herself look at her reflection. For the first time since she woke up, she was really left alone and without the fear that someone was going to just walk in and start talking to her about things she couldn’t remember. She knew that Jake really did want to help, and she was sure he understood that she needed some time to herself. 

Amy sat down on the edge of the tub and listened to the shower while she considered the situation she had found herself in. She was shocked to find that when she signed herself out of the hospital, they wouldn’t accept her signature because it was the one with her maiden name. After a pause, she had found that her hand knew how to write “Amy Peralta” quite well, and she didn’t know where she had learned that. She shook her head and stripped off the gross clothes from the previous day, leaving them in a pile on the floor. Normally she would try to fold them or go put them in the hamper, but she didn’t want to leave the bathroom again until she was done, knowing Jake was out there.

Wanting to talk to Jake was not a feeling Amy was familiar with. She knew she wanted to spend time with him, a part of her just wanted to sit next to him and watch a movie, she wanted to go back to the casual she was sure Jake remembers that they are. After a while Amy found she was just standing under the water, letting it run over her. She had a vague thought, one she couldn’t tell if it was a memory or not, of Jake threatening to join her if she didn’t get out of the shower soon, and her response of telling him he wouldn’t dare. She remembered the feeling of his arms around her. She blushed and pushed the thought away. There was no way that Jake was going to come in the bathroom now, and she knew that, and it was even more far fetched that he would threaten to join her, because even if she couldn’t really remember him, from what she’s seen so far, she knows he’s respectful. 

For a while, Amy found herself staring at the body wash she knew wasn’t hers. “I’ll just open it,” she thought, “just to see if it is the scent I noticed when he got close to me.” Amy popped the top open and found herself relax again. To her it was the smell of home and warmth and comfort. She found herself thinking of a time when she was complaining about something at work, she couldn’t remember, but she could almost see Jake lounging on the sofa, just smiling and watching her. She had huffed and let herself fall on top of him, he grunted at the impact, but he put his arms around her and pulled her to him. She laid her head on his shoulder and mumbled, “You changed your body wash.” He had asked her if she liked it, and she nodded. 

Amy hesitated for a moment before she decided to use his body wash instead of her own. It made her feel safe, and she wasn’t sure if she was ashamed of that or not, and she hoped Jake wouldn’t notice it. 

When she got out of the shower, she realized a fatal flaw in marching into the bathroom to get away from Jake and his questions. She hadn’t grabbed herself anything to wear. Either she was going to have to put the gross clothes from the hospital back on, or she had to walk to the bedroom in just a towel and hope that Jake wouldn’t see her. She felt ridiculous, he was her husband, he had probably seen her naked before, but she didn’t want him to see her in a towel now. Amy sighed and opened the door, but then paused, there was a small pile of clothes next to the door that Jake must have put out for her. She knew she didn’t lock the door, he could have put them just inside, but he hadn’t, he had given her her space and she appreciated that. 

Amy picked up the pile and brought it back into the bathroom with her. Either he had folded them for her, or he had picked them up already folded and carefully made sure they stayed that way. On top of the pile was her old NYPD sweatshirt, then socks and underwear (she blushed a little, but still knew it was ridiculous), then plain black leggings. They were clothes that she probably would have picked for herself, comfort clothes, she always wore her NYPD sweatshirt when she was really cold or felt like she needed a little more security. Amy couldn’t decide if she hated or loved that Jake knew she would want that sweatshirt. 

“Jake?” Amy called out as she stepped out of the bathroom. She waited for a response, but none came, and she couldn’t hear him moving around anywhere. She walked to the bedroom, maybe he had fallen asleep, and she could put her dirty clothes in the hamper. He wasn’t there either, so she walked out and into the kitchen where she found a little note on the counter.

The handwriting was awful and looked rushed, but Amy found herself smiling before she even read it. “Ames, I figured you’d want some time to look around and get your bearings without me hovering behind you. Call me when you want me to come back, if you don’t want me to come back tonight, don’t worry about it, it’s fine. I’ll be at Charles’ if you need me. Feel free to snoop through whatever you want. Jake.” He had drawn in a little heart before his name, so Amy took it to mean “love, Jake.” She rolled her eyes at his antics, but she found it endearing, it took her a moment to process the contents of the letter. 

He had decided for her that he was going to remove himself from the apartment, for a moment she was mad that he had taken that decision from her, but then she realized that she wasn’t really making a decision anyway. It took her too long to realize that he probably needed his own space to process everything as well, and that of his support group, one of them didn’t even remember him, but at least another lived close by. 

The apartment felt quiet and empty without Jake in it, but she figured that he was right, that she needed to look through their shared belongings on her own so that she didn’t have to worry about his constant presence or upsetting him. She got to just be herself, the one she actually remembered being. 

Amy made a beeline for the table with all the pictures on them, and picked up the one she had looked at before. Everything in that photo reinforced what everyone was telling her, that she had somehow fallen in love with Jacob Peralta and that he was enamored with her as well. Photo Amy looked so happy and comfortable in Jake’s arms, and Photo Jake looked content and filled with adoration for her. It was similar to the first look he gave her when she woke up. Then, it had scared her, and it still worried her now, but she felt slightly more comfortable with it knowing that he had looked at her like that for years now, it was natural to him. The thought that she might not love him after all was both terrifying and a relief. The part of her that thought it was terrifying knew that she would sooner or later be able to get back into synch with him, while the part of her that felt it was a relief felt guilty at how much it would hurt him. 

A quick scan of the room showed Jake’s influence on the place, the Die Hard poster in the corner, the stacks of DVDs on the floor by the tv, and an addition of some knick knacks, some of which were ones Amy remembered being on his desk. She took it in and let herself relax at the sight of it, while it wasn’t how she remembered the room, it was still a room she knew, and this still felt like home to her. The kitchen was the same, it was tidy and not much on the counters, but at the same time she got the feeling that it had seen more use since Jake moved in. She was never much of a cook, but she thought that Jake secretly was, possibly because of Charles’ influence. The fridge had more food in it than she remembered ever being inside it, and she rolled her eyes at the bottle of orange soda in the fridge door. Notes were placed all over the fridge, magnetized in what seemed to be random order. Some of them had her own handwriting, while others had what Amy recognised as Jake’s chicken scratch. 

“Spaghetti tonight?” from Jake.

“Maybe, do we have tomato sauce?” was Amy’s response on the same post it.

“Stop leaving weird notes on the fridge,” Amy had written, but she got the feeling she didn’t mean it.

“Make me,” Jake had replied. 

“I’m making burgers, want anything specific for it?” Jake had written on one towards the side of the fridge.

“Surprise me,” Amy had written underneath. 

They continued on like that, notes to each other, probably written while they were in the same room and could have just talked about it, and it seemed they didn’t regularly take them down. Amy hated how disorganised it was, but she had apparently given in to it ages ago.

Amy found herself staring at the pack of post its that seemed to have found a home on the countertop next to the fridge. She peeled one off the top and picked up a pen from the pile behind it, once again Amy cringed at the disorganised state of it, but didn’t do anything about it. 

“Jake, I need your help,” she had written before she could stop herself. Her handwriting was off somehow, and she was surprised to see her hand was shaking. She stuck it to the fridge under a magnet that looked like a tiny crossword puzzle. 

It was her bedroom that she was most afraid to enter. She knew what it looked like to her, and she knew it must have changed since Jake slept there too. The door was shut, Jake must have closed it before he left, and Amy had had her hand on the doorknob for a while before she turned it and let the door swing open. 

The bed was still hers, possibly a different mattress, but it had been moved against the opposite wall. The bedside table on the right side had her glasses and a book placed on it, the one on the left had another pair of glasses she was sure weren’t hers and a little notebook. She wanted to know what was written in the notebook, and while Jake had said she could “snoop through whatever” she wanted, she still didn’t want to. 

The closet looked strange to her with half of it taken up by men’s shirts, most of which were plaid. Her dresser had some of her makeup strewn over the top, and the mirror had one note stuck to it, “Uh, that color with  _ that _ dress… okay.” Once again it was Jake’s handwriting, and Amy couldn’t fathom why she had left it there, which she must have done, because if the last thing she did was go to work, there was no way she was wearing a dress. 

The entire apartment was both familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. The layout was the same, a lot of the furniture was the same, but things had been added to it here and there, and Amy could tell it had a much more “domestic” feel to it than it ever did what she was living in it alone. Jake seemed to have brought personality into her home, and she had felt comfortable enough to let her own seep through as well. 

Amy sat down on the couch and looked around, not sure what to do. There were a lot of DVDs, there was a bookshelf in the corner, which Jake had added to, she could see, there were some games and magazines on and under the coffee table, but nothing appealed to her. She wanted to talk about her life, and she knew the best person to do that with, but she wasn’t sure how to do it. She looked around for her phone, it was in her little bag of personal things she had put somewhere in the kitchen. It was probably dead, but she should be able to find the charger. 

The little bag of her things was on the kitchen counter, and Amy didn’t know how she didn’t see it before. She was too preoccupied with reading the notes on the fridge. She stared at the little bag because it looked like Jake had tipped its contents out. The rings were placed carefully towards the back of the counter and against the wall, her badge was in front of them, and her phone was lying next to it, already plugged in. She picked it up to see she had gotten texts and phone calls from several people, not all of whom were names she remembered. She tried to unlock the phone, but it said she had the wrong passcode, she frowned and tried again, only to receive the same message. She hadn’t changed that code in years, when would she have done that, and to what? 

Amy stared at the wall, where a calendar was, she had written in important dates, and things like doctors appointments, while Jake had written in nonsense in some places, sometimes Die Hard quotes. She walked over to the calendar and flipped through it. What date would she have changed it to, if she changed it to a date at all. She tried what was written in as their wedding anniversary, the anniversary of their relationship, and several other dates she could remember until her phone told her she only had two more attempts left before it reset itself. She stared at the lock screen for a few minutes before tentatively typing in “5, 2, 5, 3.” The phone unlocked and once again, Amy was hit with how many people had reached out to her. She scrolled through her contacts before she found the right name and hit the call button.

“Hi,” Amy said into the phone, “can we talk? Yeah, at my apartment. Thanks.”

  
  



	5. Executive Decision

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter is kinda short. The next one is literally double in length, so I guess look forward to that one next week! Thank you all so much for reading!

**Jake**

 

Jake watched Amy walk into the bathroom and shut the door without so much as a glance back at him. He sighed and rubbed his eyes, he was tired, he was stressed, and sleep on a hospital chair was not the best sleep he had ever gotten. For a while, he didn’t move, he just stared at where Amy had walked away from him, and he was starting to accept that that was how this might all end, with Amy walking away from him. He felt a physical pang in his chest, and forced himself to keep it down, to keep it together.

Amy was confused and scared and lost, and Jake was angry that he couldn’t be the person to help her, no matter how much he wanted to. He was frustrated that the only way he could help Amy was if she let him, and she didn’t seem ready to do that yet, so the most obvious solution to him was to remove himself from the equation, even if it hurt him to do it. Even if it was the last thing he wanted to do. 

He pulled out his phone and dialed a number from memory.

“Jake!”

“Hi, Charles,” Jake said.

“What’s going on? How’s Amy? She doesn’t have her memory, Jakey? She has to remember you, though, right? Right?” Charles sounded panicked, and suddenly Jake wasn’t sure this was the best idea, but if he was going to leave, Charles lived closest to him, which meant it would be easy for him to get to, and easy to get back when Amy was ready. 

“We’re back home,” Jake said, “but no, she doesn’t have any memory from the nine-nine. She remembers meeting us, but that’s it. She’s doing okay considering, she’s in a bit of pain from the head wound and the bruised ribs, but yeah, she’s okay. And no, no she doesn’t remember me.” He felt himself choke up towards the end, and hoped that Charles hadn’t heard it. “I uh, I wanted to ask you if it’s okay for me to crash at your place for a bit? Amy wanted to come home, but I don’t think she’s completely comfortable with me being here as well.”

There was silence for a moment.

“Yes,” Charles said, “yes you can stay here, it’ll be like a sleepover! But Jake—”

“We’ll talk about it more later,” Jake said, “I gotta go, I’ll be there in a few, okay?”

He didn’t wait for Charles’ response before he hung up. Jake leaned against the kitchen counter and ran his fingers through his hair. He didn’t know how well he would survive this. Being shot, fine, going undercover for the FBI and joining the mafia, exciting, being put in witness protection, frustrating but manageable, being arrested and put in jail, awful but he could handle it, having Amy forget who he is and threaten the possibility of leaving him, the worst thing he could imagine. 

The cool surface of the counter helped Jake ground himself, he turned around to find that Amy had just thrown her little bag of stuff up there. After considering for a moment, Jake turned out its contents. Without looking at the rings too much, he pushed them to the back of the counter. He let his hand linger over the little pieces of metal, the last time he had touched her engagement ring without her wearing it was when he proposed. Then he lined up her badge in front of the rings, and pulled out her phone. Jake flipped it over and over, even though he knew that at this point it was just paperweight, he pulled at one of the wires that was already plugged into the wall and plugged in the phone. Its screen lit up and Jake placed it face-down on the counter, he didn’t really want to see all the people who had texted and called her as well. 

Next thing Jake knew he needed to do was gather some of his stuff up. He had left the bedroom in a bit of a disarray when he had left the previous morning, they were both late, his fault, and he couldn’t help but smile at the thought, but he pushed it away quickly. It was quick work, picking up some of the stray clothes off the floor and tugging the bedsheets into a position that made it look like the bed had been made. Jake got on the floor and reached towards the back of the closet for the small duffle bag that was buried in there somewhere. When he got hold of it, he opened it and blindly threw some of his clothes into it, he didn’t know how long he was going to be gone, he hoped it wasn’t long, but he knew there was no guarantee. He threw the bag onto the bed and let himself just sit on the floor, curled up, for just a moment. It was a moment of weakness he knew he needed to have, one he would usually be comfortable showing in front of Amy, partly because he knew she wouldn’t judge him, but also because she would be there for him. Not this time, though.

When Jake moved to stand up, he overbalanced and found himself staring at Amy’s side of the closet. Her NYPD sweatshirt was stuffed towards the back, and he automatically reached for it. Sweatshirts were made to be soft, but this one was even softer from constant wear. Jake found himself folding it and grabbing some of Amy’s other comfy clothes for her. He hesitated outside the bathroom door with the small pile of Amy’s clothes before he settled on just leaving them folded on the ground outside the door. He wrote a quick note and left it on the kitchen counter. By the time he had got back to the bedroom to grab the duffle bag, the shower had been turned off. He grabbed the bag and using some of the skills he learned being a detective, he made his way silently back to the front door. Just as he was about to close the door behind him, he heard Amy call out his name, he hesitated a moment before he pulled the door shut, the automatic lock went into place and Jake realized that he had just put a physical barrier between himself and Amy. For a moment, he hated himself for it, and he hoped he was doing the right thing. 

He took the stairs down, down was always easier than up, and tried to smile at his neighbors when they greeted him as he passed by. Most people in apartment complexes had no idea who each other were, but that wasn’t the Amy Santiago style. She had learned everyone’s names and jobs and had introduced every single one of them to Jake when he moved in with her. It was easier when he made it to the street, where nobody knew who he was or what he was going through. Jake felt selfish thinking of how he felt knowing that Amy probably felt worse, but he let himself have it, just a little bit, because he knew he had to acknowledge that this was difficult for him too. 

After a much shorter time than he hoped, Jake found himself standing in front of Charles’ door. He knocked and Charles opened it almost instantly. Jake slid in the apartment before Charles could make a scene in the hallway. 

“Oh, Jake, I’m so sorry!” Charles said and threw his arms around Jake, he stood there and let it happen.

“It’s going to be okay,” Jake said, not sure if he was reassuring himself or Charles. “The doctor says she should get her memories back, but in the meantime I wanted to give her space. It’s cool if I crash on the couch, right?”

“Yes,” Charles said, and then he started going on about “comfort food” which Jake was sure would be less comfortable and more vomit-inducing, but he just let Charles continue, he knew there was no way of making him stop anyway. “What are you going to do?” Charles asked. “I mean, if Amy doesn’t remember you? She has to remember you, right Jake?”

“I don’t know,” Jake said, honestly. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. The best case scenario is that she does remember, worst is that she leaves me.” Jake shrugged and tried for nonchalant, but he knew Charles wasn’t fooled. 

“No,” Charles said, “worst is that you have to make her fall in love with you again. You did it once, you can do it again! You’re the best, Jake, and she has to know that.”

Jake tried to smile at his friend, but he didn’t think it came across very well. “Thanks, Charles.” 

Charles sat down on the couch and waited for Jake to sit next to him. “Do you want to talk about it?” Charles asked.

“I don’t know how,” Jake said. “I think this is worse than when I knew I had feelings for her, but she was with Teddy. Now she knows I have feelings for her, that’s obvious, and at least before she cared, I don’t think she does now. She’s concentrating on herself, which is fine, I totally get it, but I’m so used to turning to her for help. I can’t do that right now, and everything feels wrong. 

“I’m scared she’ll leave me, and then I don’t know where I’m going to live, because the apartment was hers in the first place, so it’s obviously going to be hers after. I know that I’ll never find anyone again, I know it’s just always going to be her. And it’ll be worse than before I was with her, because at least then I knew that I wouldn’t find anyone and that work was all I had, but now I’ll know what I could have had. I’ll know what I lost. I think that ‘better to have loved and lost’ thing is bullshit. I wouldn’t feel so broken right now if I didn’t know what I was losing. How can you miss what you never had, you know?” For a guy that didn’t know how to talk about it, he had a lot to say, and for a moment, Charles looked shocked.

“First of all,” Charles said quickly, trying to head Jake off before he went into another spiral, “you have me and the rest of the nine-nine, we’re all here for you, both of you. And second, you know Amy isn’t just thinking about herself, you know she’s worried about you, even if she doesn’t remember you, you know it. Third, she won’t leave you.”

“You don’t know that,” Jake whispered. “You don’t know that, Charles.”

“Yes, I do,” Charles said. “I do because you two are soulmates.” Jake glanced at Charles, unamaused. “No, really! You two have always been perfect for each other, I told you from the beginning, I called it!”

“Charles.”

“You’re not going to lose her,” Charles said much quieter. “I know you’re not.”

Jake paused for a moment. “Do you want to watch a movie?”

“Die Hard?”

“You know it,” Jake said with fake enthusiasm, and he knew Charles could tell, but he was glad that he just put on the movie. Charles talked through the whole thing, and usually Jake would join in with him, but Jake was glad for the excuse to mindlessly stare at a screen. He needed to pull himself together, he needed to stop moping, and he needed to believe that Amy wasn’t going to leave him with the same certainty that Charles did. He had said he was going to make her fall in love with him again if he needed to, and that’s just what he was going to do.

Jake stood up abruptly, and Charles started beside him. Not knowing exactly what his plan was, Jake just stood still. “I gotta go.”

“Back to Amy?” Charles asked.

“No, I need to do something,” Jake said as he pulled his hoodie tighter around him and walked out the door, leaving Charles confused on his couch. 

Jake ran down the street and found himself faltering, he didn’t know exactly what he was doing, but maybe it would help a bit. He found himself in an art supply store and bought a huge whiteboard, a few binders, and bits and pieces of other supplies he thought he might need. Carrying all of that stuff back to Charles’ apartment wasn’t the easiest thing to manage, but by the time he got back, he felt a little relief in knowing that he was doing something.

“What’s all that?” Charles asked when he opened his door again. “Jake, what are you doing?”

“I need your help,” Jake said as he began to lay out all of the supplies he had gathered. 

  
  



	6. Said and Unsaid

**Amy**

 

Waiting for someone always made Amy nervous, and this time wasn’t any different. She wanted to do something to prepare, but she didn’t know what she was supposed to do. Her grandmother would say to prepare tea, but Amy didn’t feel like that was the right thing to do in this situation, so she just waited. Amy tried to pass the time by looking at the things in her home she didn’t recognise, but everything brought her back to Jake, not that that was a bad thing, just not something she thought she could process at the moment. 

When someone knocked on the door, Amy jumped and looked around. Now she wasn’t sure if she had made the wrong call, both literally and figuratively. The walk to the front door was longer than she thought it should be, and she hesitated a moment before she opened the door. 

“Hey,” Amy said, and tried to smile. 

“Hey,” the woman briefly wrapped her arms around Amy, and let go much quicker than anyone else would have. “How are you doing? Where’s Jake?”

“I’m sorry,” Amy started as she stepped aside to let the other woman in, “but, you’re Rosa, right?”

Rosa paused for a moment and waited for Amy to shut the door before she answered. “Yeah.”

“Thanks for coming over,” Amy said. “And uh, I’m okay. Jake left. Do you want something to drink?”

“Do you have beer?” Rosa asked.

Amy paused. “I have no idea.”

Rosa’s mouth quirked up into a small smile. “What did you want to talk about?”

Amy thought that maybe she had made the right choice in calling Rosa, she wasn’t someone who was going to walk carefully around Amy, she wasn’t someone who was going to avoid topics or be uncomfortable, she was what Amy needed in that moment, someone who was just going to tell her what’s what, and without hesitation. 

“I was just hoping you could answer some of my questions.”

“Why didn’t you ask Jake?”

“I didn’t know how to.” Rosa nodded slowly and then settled on the couch. She made a “go ahead” gesture and waited for Amy to do something. “I married Jake?” she didn’t mean for that to be her first question, or for it to sound so accusatory, but Rosa didn’t even flinch.

“Obviously.”

“Why?”

“You love him, he loves you, it’s sickening.”

Amy got the feeling she didn’t really mean the last part, but she ignored it. “But how?”

“You guys just do. If all you’re going to ask me about is your relationship, then I’m leaving. I know we’re friends, but we’re not that kind of friends.”

Amy nodded, and like with Jake, found herself smiling at Rosa’s antics, even though she wasn’t sure if the other woman should make her feel on edge. Amy had a flash of an image, Rosa in a nice dress sitting with her legs splayed open in a bridal shop, telling Amy to spin in the dress she was wearing, a wedding gown, and then being in the precinct, Rosa telling Amy that it didn’t matter that she wanted a nice wedding dress, that she deserved one. This woman wasn’t someone who was good with feelings, but Amy knew she would be there for her no matter what, and Amy would be there for Rosa if she needed it. 

“Did I take the Sargent’s exam?” Amy asked.

“Yeah,” Rosa said, “you are one.”

“What?” Amy asked. “Really, I am?”

“Yup.”

The room went quiet, Amy felt like she would usually get annoyed with Rosa’s tendency to keep things short and not feel the need to embellish, but at the moment, she was happy to get the time to think about it.

“Okay,” Amy said slowly, “and Holt is our captain.” This time it felt like she was making a statement instead of asking a question, but Rosa answered anyway.

“Yeah. You really don’t remember anything, do you?”

“Small bits here and there,” Amy said, “but no, I don’t.”

“That must suck,” Rosa said. “This must be weird.”

“It is,” Amy said, glad that Rosa seemed to get it. She knew that everyone else who was trying to help her understood as well, but it was the way that Rosa stated it made Amy feel more reassured. 

They talked for about an hour more, mostly about the precinct and Amy’s job, which Amy was very glad to find herself still partially on the track she had set for herself years ago. Talking with Rosa felt more and more natural as they continued, and she got the feeling that Rosa was glad that Amy had reached out to her, even though she was sure Rosa would never admit it. 

“Thanks,” Amy said. “I still don’t think I have a clear picture of everything, and I don’t think I remember anything else, really, but I appreciate you doing this for me.” 

Rosa nodded. 

“I know you said that we’re not the kind of friends that talk about relationships,” Amy started, and Rosa quirked an eyebrow at her, “But maybe just a little bit?” Rosa didn’t say anything and Amy took that as permission to continue. “First I want to ask about you, are you seeing anybody?”

“Maybe,” Rosa shrugged, “right now it’s casual, I don’t know. She and I haven’t talked much about it.”

Amy thought of Rosa in the briefing room, giving them one minute to ask about her being bisexual, and Amy smiled a little, knowing that that must be a memory too. “Okay, well, I hope whatever it is works out how you want it,” Amy said, and Rosa rolled her eyes dramatically. “Have you spoken to Jake about… about all this?”

“Not yet,” Rosa said. “I sent him a text and a voicemail. He didn’t respond, the idiot.”

“Everyone keeps telling me to trust him.”

“Yeah.”

“You think I should?”

“Do you want to?”

“What?”

“Do you want to trust him? Right now you just have all these strangers telling you what you should know, who you should believe and who you are. But you know you better than anyone else does, even if you don’t remember it. You gotta trust yourself first, so do you want to trust him?”

“But he’s—”

“It doesn’t matter what he is,” Rosa said sternly, “it matters what you think he is to you, not what everybody else is telling you he is to you. So what’s important is do you want to?”

“I don’t know,” Amy admitted.

“Then I think that’s something you need to figure out before you do anything else,” Rosa said and stood up. “Call me if you need me.” Rosa said over her shoulder as she walked out the door. 

Amy sat, dumbstruck, for a moment at Rosa’s abrupt departure, but ended up rolling her eyes and sighing. She had probably gotten Rosa to sit and talk to her for a lot longer than she normally would have anyway. 

Once again Amy found herself staring at her phone contacts. She scrolled back and forth between several names before she decided on one, and stared at the name for a while. She closed her eyes and tapped the phone where the call button should be, if it called, then she’d call, if not, she’d call the other person. She heard ringing and brought the phone to her ear, she didn’t have to wait long for him to pick up.

“Hey,” Jake said through the phone. “What’s up, Amy?”

“I just talked to Rosa,” Amy found herself saying.

“Okay,” Jake said slowly. “How did that go?”

“Well,” Amy said, “it went well. At least, as well as it could with her, I think.”

“She’s not the most talkative,” Jake said. “I think sometimes that’s what I like about her.”

“I think that’s why I called her,” Amy admitted. 

“I can see that,” Jake said.

This was easier, Amy thought, talking to him over the phone was easier because she didn’t feel the need to overanalyze anything he was doing, how he was looking at her. She realised she had been quiet for a little too long when she heard Jake say her name.

“Did you need something?”

“Can you come back?” Amy asked quickly, before she let herself panic too much and talk herself out of it. She liked how he made her feel, she liked how his touch relaxed her, even though she was stressed out. She liked that even if she couldn’t force any memories to come back to her, she knew with absolute certainty that she trusted Jake Peralta with her life and that she would do anything for him. Her certainty still scared her a little, but it felt more comforting than scary now that she had talked through a few things with Rosa.

“Oh,” Jake said hesitantly. 

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Amy said.

“No!” Jake said. “No, I want to. I just, well, give me twenty minutes? I can be there in twenty minutes.”

“Okay,” Amy said.

“Okay,” Jake said. “I’ll see you soon. I lo—”

For a moment all Amy could hear through the phone was static, and possibly Charles in the background.

“It’s okay,” she said. “It’s okay. I’ll see you soon.”

“Bye.”

“Bye.”

When she had hung up the phone, she stared at it for a moment. It still said Jake’s name, and then the phone went dark. Once again, Amy found herself waiting for someone, and usually she didn’t mind, it was like a stakeout, she had the patience for it, but she still wanted something to do in the meantime. She found herself sat on the floor organising the DVDs that were on the floor and around the tv. Not knowing how they were usually organised, she settled with just piling them up. 

After a while, Amy whipped around because she heard a small knock on the door as it opened. 

“Hey,” Jake said, letting himself in the apartment. “I wasn’t sure if I should knock or just come in or what.” He shut the door and stood awkwardly in front of it, but mainly because of the all the things he was carrying. He was smiling at her, and this time he didn’t stop when she looked at him. 

“It’s fine,” Amy said. “What is all that?”

“Oh,” Jake said and looked at the miscellaneous items in his arms as if he were surprised they were there. “We can, uh, we can get to that. Did you want to talk to me?” 

“I’m more curious about all that, now.”

“Okay,” Jake said and walked into the room, he dropped a lot of what he was holding on the floor and walked up to the tv to balance a huge whiteboard against it. “I thought, it could be a terrible idea, but I thought I could help walk you through our relationship and other parts of your life. This whiteboard is as close as I could remember to the whiteboard from our bet.”

Amy didn’t say anything, she just watched him, slightly amused by how excited and nervous he seemed all at once. Jake seemed to take that as encouragement to continue.

“Whatever part of your life you want to go over, we can. Or something else,” Jake said, still smiling. “I also made these binders, Charles helped, of cases that were important to you. Ones we worked on together, ones you worked on with Rosa or Charles. They’re not exactly right because I’m just working from memory. I kinda wanted to get the actual case files, but I thought Holt might kill me if I took case files home again. And if there’s anybody who could plan out the perfect murder and never get caught, it’s Holt.” Amy was reminded a little of a child excited to show his parents the project he worked on all day at school, she was touched a little bit more by it though because she knew that Jake did it all for her. 

“Took case files home ‘again?’” Amy asked.

“Long story,” Jake said and waved his hand. “We can talk about it, but it’s not that important.” Amy just looked at him. “There was a suspected mole in the precinct, they thought it was me, I got suspended. It wasn’t me, obviously, everything was fine, but we did learn some horrifying truths that day including I apparently hoard case files and it’s ‘not healthy’ according to Holt. Whatever.” Jake shrugged and Amy was caught between smiling and being aghast at him. “What do you want to talk about first?” Jake asked, still excited, but when Amy didn’t respond, he deflated a little. “If, um, if you want to talk about anything at all.”

“Yes,” Amy yelled a little too loud, which for some reason got a small smile from Jake. “Yes, I want to talk to you, but first, what about work? When do I get to go back? What are you doing? And from my phone I can tell there are a lot of people worried about me, I need to contact all of them, but I don’t know who to contact first.”

“Amy,” Jake said and laughed a little. “Amy calm down. Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. Everyone who needs to know about what happened knows, Holt has given you time off until you ‘are confident in your abilities to return.’” Jake used a deeper voice and made a face during that last part of the sentence, and Amy quirked an eyebrow at him. “That was Holt, what he sounds like. Anyway, you only have to worry about you and getting better, and I know that can be annoying, but we’re all here for you,” he hesitated a moment, “I’m here for you.” 

“Thank you, Jake,” Amy said, and Jake beamed back at her. “Explain the whiteboard to me, please.”

“With pleasure m’lady,” Jake said and did a dramatic bow. “So! This was how we went on our first date, not a real date, I don’t know, we called it a date. And it was because we made a bet over who could make the most arrests. If I won, you had to go on the worst date ever with me, and if you won, you got my car.” He continued with the story, doing impressions of everyone else and including details Amy thought he should have left out if he wanted her to like him again, but then again, it was all things she must have known and experienced when she agreed to marry him, so maybe it wasn’t a bad idea to tell her that he had gotten a male stripper to attempt to give her a lap dance the day after, but found himself becoming a physical barrier between her and the stripper. 

Every once in a while, Amy interrupted him with a question, and Jake was always happy to answer. He had a lot of energy and seemed glad that he had gotten Amy’s attention. This was the Jake that felt familiar to her, the one who acted things out and told stories, the one who spoke before he could think things through, the one who would do anything for his friends, including relive embarrassing moments from their past for her entertainment and benefit. The one who was her best friend. 

“Have you eaten yet?” Jake suddenly asked. He had just finished telling her a little bit about their first “real” date, because she had asked about it, when they had both openly admitted feelings for each other, and she got the feeling that while he was actually concerned if she had eaten, he seemed eager to gloss over the end of the date. 

“So, the date ended well that time?” Amy asked, “No arrests involved?”

“No,” Jake said, “no arrests that time. Seriously though, Ames, you need to eat.”

He was already standing because he had acted out a lot of their first date, the one because of the bet, so he was able to make a quick getaway to the kitchen. Jake seemed to be on autopilot, pulling out a pot and pasta and setting everything up. “Pasta okay? It’s just quick and easy for right now.”

“Yeah,” Amy said, “it’s fine. Jake?”

“Yeah?”

“We didn’t tell anyone right away that we were dating?”

“No we didn’t. That didn’t last very long, though.”

“That must have freaked me out a bit.”

“Yeah, it did,” Jake laughed a little.

“We made rules,” Amy said slowly, she didn’t know were she was getting it from, but it seemed right to her, “we made rules and we broke a rule almost immediately.”

“Uh, yeah,” Jake was closing off again.

“Don’t do that,” Amy said. She was suddenly worried, she had finally gotten to see Jake, the real Jake, for a while, and she didn’t want him to leave again.

“Sorry,” Jake sighed, “I just don’t want you to be uncomfortable, I don’t want to push you.”

“I’m asking, though.” 

“Okay,” Jake turned around to face her and leaned against the counter, right next to the hot stove with boiling water. Amy automatically reached out and pushed him so he’d at least step away from the pot filled with pasta. Jake smiled at her, it seemed that this was something he did regularly. “We had agreed not to have sex right away, to keep things light and breezy,” Jake rolled his eyes a little, “we had sex that night.” Jake was staring at the ground, a small smile on his face, a private smile, one from a fond memory. 

“So light and breezy didn’t work out, huh?” Amy asked. She knew they must have had sex, they were married, but hearing him say it out loud made it feel more real. She understood why Jake was avoiding the topic, he didn’t want her to feel like that’s what he expected, or that he immediately wanted to go back to being that close with her. 

“No,” Jake said, “Thinking back, I don’t think you and me could ever have done light and breezy.”

“You and I,” Amy corrected automatically. 

“Whatever,” Jake rolled his eyes and smiled at her. “Everyone found out after we accidentally kinda killed our captain at the time.”

“What?” Amy asked, shocked. “Wait, not Holt? He was the captain then, right?”

“No,” Jake said and turned back to the pasta to stir it, “Holt was transferred out, he came back after a short while, but yeah, for a little bit he wasn’t our captain. First we had this crazy guy who was obsessed with efficiency, he walked in on us making out and had a heart attack.”

“Why were we kissing at work?”

“Well, we had already broken one rule, I guess we thought fuck the rest of them.”

“So,” Amy mused for a moment, “being with you makes me an idiot sometimes.”

“I think that’s a good thing,” Jake turned back to her, “because I’m an idiot all the time and being with you makes me smarter sometimes.”

“No you’re not.”

“What?”

“You’re not an idiot,” Amy automatically said. “You’re a really great detective and I’ve told you this so many times, honestly, you have such a big ego, I don’t understand how you still think you’re not smart.” Jake reached out to her, but this time when he hesitated, she grabbed his hand and whispered, “it’s okay.” He gently, slowly, giving her every opportunity to change her mind, to back away from him, wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close to him. She let herself relax into his hold, and just react so that her own arms were wrapped around his waist.

“Thank you,” Jake whispered into her hair. She wasn’t sure what he was thanking her for, the compliment, or the hug. He pulled her tight for just a moment before he let go, sooner than he probably wanted to, Amy thought. 

“How long did the doctor say it would take me to remember things?” Amy asked.

“Ah, I’m not sure,” Jake frowned. “I don’t think she really had an answer. Why, what do you remember?”

“Nothing solid,” Amy said. “Just a few things here and there. Like how when Rosa was here I remembered wedding dress shopping with her. Earlier I remembered watching movies with you on the couch. Nothing important seems to be coming to me, though.”

“That’s not true,” Jake said. “All of it is important. If that’s what you remember, then it’s important just because you remembered it. Do you want cheese?” Jake reached for the fridge door and Amy saw him glance at all the post its on it. She hoped he didn’t see the one she had written earlier, because that wasn’t a conversation she wanted to have with him right now. 

“Yeah, sure,” Amy said, partially just to get his attention off the fridge door. He pulled out cheese and then moved to grab each of them bowls as well. “Do you always cook?”

“Usually, I do,” Jake said, grabbing them both forks and then handing her one of the bowls of pasta. “You’re not the best cook out there. Do you want to sit at the table or on the couch?”

“Couch,” Amy said and started to walk towards it. “I didn’t know you could cook. I mean, well, I guess I did but…”

Jake laughed and sat down next to her. He toed off his shoes and then pulled both legs up on the couch and turned with his back against the arm of the couch so he could face her. “You’re the only one who does know, and I forced you to swear a vow of secrecy that nobody will ever know, especially not Charles. Even though you don’t remember promising that, I’m still gonna hold you to it.” 

“You made the turkey for Christmas,” Amy said.

“I’m Jewish,” Jake said.

“I know,” Amy said and playfully hit his leg. “But it was technically Christmas day one year, it was just us and you made a whole turkey dinner because you wanted to prove to me that you could do it. That was the first time I really saw you cook.”

“Yeah,” Jake said. “That’s more or less what happened.” He was grinning at her, and she wasn’t sure if it was because she remembered something, or because they both finally seemed relaxed with each other.

“You make most of our dinners when we’re home.”

“I do, because if I let you do it, it won’t be edible.”

“But you’re actually good at it.”

“And as I said, even though you don’t remember it, I made you swear to never tell anybody. We pinky promised an everything,” Jake said. “And if you break a pinky promise, I get to cut off your pinky.”

“I regret ever telling you the history of pinky promises. You wouldn’t do it, anyway.”

“No, I wouldn’t, but that’s because you won’t tell,” Jake insisted.

“I won’t,” Amy said and started laughing. “Do you want to watch a movie?”

“Sure.”

They bickered over what movie to watch for a few minutes, but Amy knew that no matter what she chose to watch, Jake would be fine with it. She ended up randomly choosing a movie on netflix, some Disney movie she couldn’t remember seeing, and couldn’t tell if it was because she actually hadn’t seen it, or if she just didn’t remember. Jake teased her for a little while about wanting to watch a kid’s movie, but Amy just rolled her eyes, and he just kept smiling at her. 

A third of the way into the movie, Amy realized that she wasn’t watching it as much as she was watching Jake. He had slouched down on the couch so that his head was pillowed by the arm, but he seemed to have also taken care to not invade her space. He had tucked one leg under the other one, which was using the coffee table as a footrest. It didn’t look like the most comfortable position to her, but he seemed content. 

“Hey Jake,” she said, he looked at her and nodded. “I want to try something.” He frowned at that, but didn’t say anything, just waited for her to continue. “Just don’t… don’t move.” Amy crawled over him, and he froze, neither of them were paying the movie any attention, and Amy kept eye contact with him, trying to gauge what he was thinking. She settled on top of him with her head on his chest and her hands on his sides. “Is this okay?”

“M-hm,” Jake mumbled back. One of his hands settled on her back, while the other one tangled in her hair. She could hear his heart pounding and she listened as his heart rate slowed back down and felt it as his muscles relaxed. Amy fell asleep listening to Jake’s heartbeat and his hand tracing aimless patterns into her back. 


	7. Progress?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry is this so late today you guys! I almost forgot to upload tonight, and I knew yesterday that I was gonna have a hectic day today, so I considered uploading yesterday, but decided against it. Maybe I should have uploaded yesterday!

**Jake**

 

Jake wanted to know what Amy was thinking, what was going through her head when she lay down on top of him. He didn’t mind, he actually kinda liked it, but he worried about why she had done it. His mind was racing and multiple scenarios came to him, some good, some bad. It was the fact that he could run his hand through her hair, though, that started to calm him down. It doesn’t matter, Jake thought, it doesn’t matter why, it matters that she is. The movie was background noise to him the second Amy had put it on, but now that she was close to him, it was even more meaningless. 

Amy had only lost her memory a short time ago, but this was the kind of moment that Jake already missed, the kind of moment he was afraid he would never get again. He let the idea that he might never be able to do this again wash over him and take over for just a moment, and then he let it go. He had found that letting the thoughts though helped him get rid of them faster than if he had just pushed them away. 

Flashes of light from the movie lit up Amy’s skin in all different colors and Jake found himself tracing some of the colors against her back, none of them lasting very long. Jake knew that in this position, Amy would fall asleep quickly, she had fallen asleep on top of him many a time before, but he wasn’t sure if he should wake her up or let her stay where she was. He wasn’t sure if it was selfish of him to want to stay in that position forever, Amy relaxed and content, pulled into his arms. 

It wasn’t until the credits started rolling that Jake realized that Amy had been asleep on top of him for almost an hour and that they should both probably go to sleep. He sighed as he accepted that he couldn’t be selfish, that they couldn’t stay like this forever. 

“Ames,” Jake whispered against her, and gently shook her shoulder. “Ames you gotta wake up just for a little bit, you should go to bed.” Amy grumbled and tucked her face into the crook of his neck, Jake smiled, but persisted in trying to wake her up. “Amy come on, you just gotta get to the bed and then you can go back to sleep. You’re going to complain about how uncomfortable the couch is in the morning if you stay here.” Amy just shook her head. Jake hesitated a moment before he asked, “Do you want me to carry you? Because I will.”

“No,” Amy mumbled and finally sat up, she blinked at him sleepily. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Jake said as he pulled himself into a seated position as well. He waited for her to stand up before he got up as well and followed her into the bedroom. As quickly and quietly as he could, he grabbed a blanket from the closet and his pillow off of the bed and turned to go back out of the bedroom.

“What are you doing?” Amy asked as she sat down on the bed.

“Oh,” Jake frowned, “I was gonna sleep on the couch. Is that okay? Would you rather I went back to Charles’? I did leave my stuff there.” 

“Yes. No,” Amy said, flustered, “yes, it’s okay.” 

Jake hesitated in the doorway. “Goodnight, Amy,” he said.

“Goodnight, Jake,” she replied. Jake smiled and stepped out of the bedroom, shutting the door behind him. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. This was going well, this was good, this was better than it could have been, but Jake still felt so empty. As much as he wanted to get into bed with Amy and just hold her as they both fell asleep, he knew he couldn’t do that. There were always nights when Jake couldn’t kiss Amy goodnight because of their work, but this was the first time in a long time that she was right there in front of him and he couldn’t just kiss her because he wanted to. 

He padded back out to the couch and threw the pillow down on one end before he haphazardly threw the blanket down as well. When he walked into the kitchen to grab a glass of water, something he actually had been drinking more often after he married Amy, he remembered the new post it he had seen on the fridge earlier. After he had reread it several times, he picked up the pen on the counter and held it over the post it for a while. He read the words “Jake, I need your help,” again and didn’t know how to reply. He tapped the post it several times before he scribbled underneath, “Okay, just tell me how.” Amy had put the ball in his court, but he had no idea what to do with it, no idea how to step forward. He thought that showing her the old cases, going over their terrible date that wasn’t actually terrible, and being himself was helping. Walking her though a little of their past was the first time since all this happened that Jake really felt like himself, and he hoped that Amy could see that, he hoped that she liked who he was then, because she used to.

The few dishes from their small dinner were in the sink and Jake knew that if he left them overnight, it would annoy Amy, so he set to work cleaning them. Cleaning dishes was normally his job anyway, he just usually had Amy there to help dry, this time he just balanced everything in the drying rack. Amy usually cleaned just about everything, and Jake was a lot less messy than he used to be, but the kitchen was his domain. Jake really did like cooking, and it was something other than police work that he was comfortable admitting he was good at, just not to anybody else, only to himself. He was the one that always made a mess of the kitchen because he was the one to use it, so he had just accepted that that meant he was the one to clean it. So it was when he was automatically wiping down the counter that he noticed Amy’s badge was still on the counter, but the rings were gone. He knew that she wasn’t wearing them earlier, that’s something he definitely would have noticed. The detective in him wanted to solve the case, while the distraught husband in him didn’t even want to know. Best case scenario, Jake figured, was that Amy had put them somewhere safe and out of sight. Worst case scenario he didn’t even want to think about. 

Frustrated, Jake ran his hands through his hair and turned back to the couch. It was more comfortable than some other places that Jake had slept before, but he was sure that he wouldn’t exactly get a restful sleep. It would at least be better than sitting in the uncomfortable plastic hospital chair. Jake pulled off his shirt and jeans before he pulled the blanket over him and lay down on the sofa. He stared at the blinking lights of the dvd and cable boxes, not sure what his next game plan was, he just hoped that he was making progress with Amy and not making things worse. 

The next thing Jake knew, somebody was shaking his shoulder. 

“Just a minute,” Jake mumbled into the pillow and pulled the blanket tighter around him.

“Jake,” Amy said. “Jake, do you have to get to work?”

“Work?” Jake asked.

“Yeah,” Amy said, “you know the place you always show up late to and for some reason they still pay you and haven’t fired you for tardiness yet.”

Jake blinked up at Amy, he took a while to focus, for a moment he was confused. He was on the couch and she was still wearing pyjamas, but asking him if he needed to get to work. Suddenly, everything rushed back to him, what had happened, and why exactly he was on the couch. Jake groaned and turned away from Amy again. “No,” Jake said, once again into the pillow. “No, I don’t have to go to work. What time is it?”

“It’s seven thirty,” Amy said.

“Do you ever sleep in?” Jake asked as he slowly shifted himself from horizontal to vertical. He stretched his arms above his head and yawned, not noticing the way Amy looked away when she realized he was only wearing his boxers and socks. 

“No,” Amy said, looking at the carpet. 

“No, I know you don’t,” Jake said and smiled. “It was kinda a rhetorical question. Holt said I could have a week off to, you know, help you. Do you want me to make breakfast?” 

“Um,” Amy said, “do you normally make breakfast in your underwear?”

“Sometimes,” Jake said, “is it making you uncomfortable?”

“No,” Amy said, “yes, maybe. I don’t know. I think I feel like I should be uncomfortable, or you should be, but I’m not.”

“I’ll go put on some sweats,” Jake said and walked into the bedroom. He rolled his eyes when he noticed that Amy had made the bed, because of course she did. He didn’t even realize he was just wearing boxers until Amy had pointed it out, normally in the morning, it wasn’t something he worried or thought about. When he walked back into the kitchen, now wearing a pair of sweatpants, he noticed Amy was in front of the fridge and she had hastily put a pen back on the counter when she noticed him walk in. He saw her glance at all the post its, but he decided to try not to look at what she had written yet. If it was something she wanted to write while he wasn’t in the room, for him to see when she wasn’t in the room, that’s how he’d let it happen. 

“Do you make breakfast as well as you make dinner?” Amy asked.

Jake laughed. “No,” he said, “my go to is either no breakfast or something that I can just grab quickly to get to work.”

“But,” Amy pressed, “when you actually have time to make breakfast. And you shouldn’t not eat breakfast, it’s the most important meal of the day.”

“You keep telling me,” Jake said as he leaned against the counter. “Did you want something specific?” Amy shrugged and just stared at him. “I’ve told you this story before but, when I was a kid, when my mom had the time, we’d make pancakes together for breakfast, and she’d let me put whatever I wanted into one of them. Most of the time it did not end well, but it was fun seeing what a pancake with gummy bears and oreo bits looked like.”

“I do not want a gummy bear pancake,” Amy said and made a face at him.

“No,” Jake said. “But do you want pancakes?”

“Do we have pancake mix?”

“No idea,” Jake said and turned around to start looking through the cupboards. “I don’t think we have mix, but he have flour and baking soda and all that other stuff. Oh, we have chocolate chips, do you want a chocolate chip pancake?” Jake asked. He had found himself sprawled on the floor with various pancake ingredients around him, and when he looked up, Amy was just staring down at him fondly. Automatically, he broke out into a grin and for a moment his heart didn’t feel as weighed down as it had the past few days. “Is that a yes?”

“Oh,” Amy said and then sat down on the floor with him. “You can really make pancakes from scratch?”

“Yeah,” Jake said. “It’s really not that hard. All you do is throw everything into a bowl and then pour it on a hot pan and wait a bit, basically.”

“Did I ever get used to knowing that you’re actually a good cook and that you actually know how to do all this stuff?” Amy asked.

“No,” Jake smiled at her. “You made me make baked alaska because you read that it was hard to make, and then you got mad because I did it easy and it tasted great.”

“How are you so good at all this?”

Jake shrugged. “My mom wasn’t always around and I had to take care of myself sometimes, and I knew she’d get mad if I was just eating junk all the time. I started making my own meals and I don’t know, recipes and stuff like that just made sense to me. They’re kinda like puzzles in their own way.” 

Amy just stared at Jake for a while and he smiled back at her. She looked at the ingredients on the floor around and between them and then back at him, but neither of them moved. 

“Hey, Ames?” Jake said and took a deep breath. “Can I ask you something?”

“Yes,” Amy whispered.

“Why did you do that last night?”

“Do what?”

“Why did you lie down on top of me?”

“I’m sorry,” Amy started, slightly panicked, “I thought it would be okay. I don’t know, it just felt right, I just wanted to do it, so I thought I may as well. I’m sorry I didn’t consider—”

“Amy!” Jake yelled over her and grabbed both her hands in his. “It’s fine, it’s good, you’re fine. I wasn’t mad or anything, I just didn’t understand why you did it. I’m glad you did.” Jake got quieter and shifted his weight before he decided to say what he was thinking. “I miss holding you, anyway.”

“Oh,” Amy said. She looked at their hands, and how Jake was still holding hers. He looked down and gently pulled away, not sure if he had overstepped. 

“I hate that I feel like I have to be careful around you.”

“Then don’t be.”

“I know,” Jake said. “I know I shouldn’t, and I don’t want to. But I also don’t want to make you uncomfortable. I’m so scared of pushing you away.”

“I can’t imagine what you’re going through,” Amy said. “I know this is hard for me because I feel lost, but I know this must be hard for you, you must feel like you’ve lost your wife.”

Jake took a deep breath, so Charles was right, Amy was still thinking of him, worrying about him, and a part of him was glad for that, but another part was upset that she felt like she had to consider his feelings too, and he hoped she wasn’t thinking of what he needed over what she needed. “And I can’t imagine what you’re going through,” Jake replied. “So many people telling you who you are what you’ve experienced, and you have to decide who you trust, even though you don’t think you know any of these people. I’m so sorry Amy. I’m so sorry and I wish I could do more than what I’m already doing, but this is all I got.”

“Thank you for saying that,” Amy said and reached for his hand. Jake felt like he burned at her touch, but somehow a good burn. 

“Can I be honest with you for a moment?” Jake asked. He didn’t know when they had gotten so close to each other, because her face was right in front of his now, and any of the food that was between them had been pushed to either side. Amy nodded and Jake took a deep breath, and hoped he wasn’t about to make a mistake. “I’m so scared of pushing you away by how much I feel for you. And before, I knew that you knew it, that it was stuff I didn’t have to say because you knew and you felt the same about me and I knew. But now things are different and I want to tell you. I understand if it’s too much for you, and like you said before, in the hospital, if you end up deciding that this isn’t what you want, that I’m not who you want, I won’t stop you. I’m asking you to please tell me if you want me to back down, to leave you alone, because I will if that’s what you want. But only tell me if you one hundred percent mean it, only if you know for certain that you don’t want me in your life anymore.

“In the meantime, I need you to know that I love you. I love you so much and you are my entire world, you are my everything. You, Amy Santiago, are my best friend and being with you has been the best part of my life. I love teasing you, and how you tease me back. I love how you put up with Die Hard for me, even when I tell you you don’t have to. I even love the fights we get into because they’re always ridiculous and I always know that even if we are truly mad at each other, it doesn’t matter. It won’t matter because we’ll figure it out, because you’re so important to me. 

“My heart aches and I think this is most serious I have been in a long time and I’m trying real hard not to make a joke about it all because that’s just who I am. Seriously, I’m so emotionally raw now and I hope you don’t expect anything like that out of me for at least five years because I have already surpassed my limit of affection I’m willing to admit to you.” 

Jake had surprised himself with all the things he had said, he wasn’t expecting any of that to come out, he had just wanted to tell her he loved her, not all the extra stuff in between. He didn’t even know he had it in him to go all out like that, and he really did feel exhausted now that he had said all that to her. It was like the dam had broken open, and he felt a little stupid, because it really had only been a few days since the accident, but Jake missed his best friend. 

“Jake, I…” Amy said slowly.

“I’m sorry,” Jake said and pulled away from her quickly. “I didn’t mean for all that to come out.”

“It’s,” Amy said, “it’s what it is. I’m going to get dressed. I uh, yeah, I’ll have chocolate chip pancakes if that’s what you want to make. I’m going to take a shower, I guess. I’ll be… I’m going to go.”

Jake watched as she walked away from him again and he wondered if he had fucked it all up. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, he had to try, he had to tell her, and if it backfired, at least he’ll know he put his all into it. All of the ingredients were now all over the kitchen and Jake quickly tried to pick them all up and get to work making breakfast. He turned to the fridge to pull out the eggs and milk when he saw the post it note again. After glancing down the hall to make sure Amy wasn’t there, Jake read the post it Amy had written in response.

“I liked how you held me last night.”

Jake smiled and picked up the pen.

“I like holding you, anytime you want me to. Is there anything else I can do?”

 

Jake relaxed a lot more around Amy, and he kept putting on little shows of cases that were important to them, not only the ones that involved their relationship, but also ones he knew she was proud of. And they left little notes to each other on the fridge, Amy seemed to keep them more lighthearted now, and Jake was fine with that, it seemed like an easier way for them to communicate sometimes. It was usually Amy asking about little things she wasn’t sure if they had happened or not, because she wasn’t sure if it was a memory. And the little post its always gave Jake an idea on what story about her life to tell next. 

Amy went back to the hospital for a check up about a week later, and the doctor told them that her recovery was going as well as it could be going. Jake was frustrated that Amy only remembered bits and pieces, but he was glad she was remembering anything at all. He was even more frustrated that since the night when Amy had lay down on top of him, she had barely touched him since. He wanted to reach out to her every chance he got, but he knew he needed to leave the ball in her court. 

It was a week and a half later, her bruised ribs had nearly healed, the doctor had said she was lucky they didn’t bruise too badly. Amy had stayed silent the entire trip back to their apartment, and Jake felt anxious about it, but he knew if she wanted to talk to him about it, she would, and he couldn’t force her. 

“I’m sorry,” Amy said when they walked into the apartment. 

“What for?” Jake asked as he walked over to the kitchen to start on dinner, he had promised her “chicken fingers that belonged in a fancy restaurant.” 

“For not remembering you,” Amy said. “For having you sleep on a couch for over a week. It’s not fair, it’s not fair on either of us, but I can only experience my perspective, and I have no idea how you’re feeling. We always talk about what I want to know. What do you want to talk about?”

“What do you mean?” Jake asked. “It’s not your fault you don’t remember, and we’re working on it, it’s going to be fine.” It was something Jake kept telling himself, and at this point he was daring to let himself believe it. “Yeah, it’s not easy, but we’ve always gotten through things together, and that’s how we’ll do it this time.”

“You scare me,” Amy whispered.

Jake’s eyes widened and he took a step back from her. He tried to mentally go over all of their interactions, what he had done wrong to warrant that reaction. A few things came to mind, but nothing he didn’t think they had already pushed past.

“Not like that!” Amy exclaimed, and held her hands up as if to surrender. “I mean, after that… speech you gave me. The one about how you feel. You’ve always let me decide what we do and what we talk about. And that wasn’t the you I remember meeting. I remember a guy who didn’t know when a prank had gone too far and turned every serious situation into a joke. But it was that speech that really made me think that maybe I did marry you, maybe I did love you.”

Jake stared at her, not sure what his face looked like, not sure what he was conveying to her. After a moment he looked away and shifted his weight from left to right, not sure what to do, or how to respond. The only thing he could concentrate on was how she had used past tense when talking about loving him. It would be even worse now, he thought, if she did leave him, because he had let himself build up hope.

“Why doesn’t my dad like you?” Amy blurted. Jake wasn’t sure  if she was trying to change the subject or if this was just something on her mind, how it could relate.

“Uh,” Jake hesitated, “why? Did he say something? We had a bit of a rocky start, but I thought we were on good terms now. Although, I think he feels like I should have done more to keep you safe. Like, I should have somehow stopped the bullet or something.”

Amy frowned. “But,” she said slowly, “there’s no way you could have done anything. By the time you could have processed the situation, I was probably already hit. It’s not your fault. Do you blame yourself?” Jake shrugged. “Please don’t.” Before Jake even knew what was happening, Amy had stood up on her tip toes and kissed him on the cheek. When she had pulled back, even she looked a little shocked by her reaction. “Um.”

“So,” Jake said and shoved his hands into his pockets, partially as something to do with them, partially so he wouldn’t feel inclined to reach out and kiss her properly. “Dinner?” Amy nodded and stared at him, slightly absentmindedly. As he walked into the kitchen, he noticed that for the first time in a long time, Amy followed him. She had been giving him space when he was cooking, and he wasn’t sure if that was something she was doing for him or for herself. Over the past few years, he had become accustomed to her just being around while he cooked. Usually just for the company, sometimes she would talk to him, sometimes she would work or just be nearby. Helping him was never something she did though, because she was worried she would mess it up immediately. 

Jake smiled to himself as he gathered ingredients and Amy sat herself on the counter. It felt so normal to him, that he had forgotten for a moment about the situation they were. He had forgotten that he had spent almost a fortnight sleeping on his couch, hoping his wife would love him again. Amy was sitting where he needed to prepare everything, so he absentmindedly picked her up and moved her over a bit. It took him a moment to realize that she was staring at him, and why. Jake froze and turned to look at her. 

“I’m sorry,” Jake said. 

“Don’t,” Amy said. “How many times have you done that before?”

Jake shrugged. “I don’t know, a lot.” 

Amy nodded and looked like she was thinking hard about something. Jake recognised that face, it was the one she made when she was figuring out a difficult part in a case, she knew she was close to cracking it, and if she just figured one more thing out, she’d solve it. Not wanting to distract Amy from whatever she was thinking, Jake didn’t move, he just waited. He didn’t know what he was waiting for, but somehow, this seemed important.

When Amy looked up, she had a determined look on her face. She reached out towards Jake, and he automatically took her hand. She pulled him in front of her and seemed to hesitate for a moment, and then suddenly her lips were pressed against his. Jake’s heart skipped a beat and if he was asked later, he would deny that he whimpered a little. One hand tangled in her hair while the other went to rest on her hip. He was hyper aware of her hands on him, one was gripping his shirt and the other was on his arm. Jake desperately wanted to deepen the kiss, to pull her closer, and it took all of his self control not to.

Amy pulled away slightly, but kept her hands on him, so Jake didn’t step back, he just looked into her eyes, trying to figure out what she was thinking. When she didn’t say anything, he smiled a little. “Hey,” he whispered through his smile. 

“Hey,” Amy said back, and then she pulled back, letting go of Jake’s shirt, giving him the hint to step back as well. He couldn’t stop smiling and his heart was pounding, and Jake didn’t know what to do, he felt a bit like he did when he was first dating her. Everything felt so new and every experience was exciting because he wasn’t sure he would ever be able to do that again. “Jake,” Amy said, her brow furrowed, “Do you still have stuff at Charles’s place?”

“Yeah,” Jake said, “Why?”

“If I asked you to leave, to go there, would you?”

Jake took a step back and his heart dropped. The small smile was gone. His heart was still pounding, but for a different reason now. “Yes,” he said, “if that’s what you wanted.” He looked away from her and found himself staring at the chicken he had pulled out of the fridge. “But,” he said, dejected, waving his hand at the food, “fancy chicken.” He tried to blink back the tears in his eyes, he refused to cry, not yet at least. 

“Jake,” Amy said and jumped down from the counter. “I’m sorry, I’m not asking you to leave. I’m really sorry, I wasn’t thinking, I was just wondering if you would, I was wondering out loud and I’m so sorry. That was cruel of me to do to you, please, I’m sorry.” She grabbed his hand and looked like she really was sorry, like she really hadn’t meant to ask him to leave hypothetically. She was looking up at him imploringly and Jake let out a shaky breath.

“Fancy chicken?” he asked quietly.

“Do you still want to make it?” Amy asked. Jake shook his head and stared at where their hands were still intertwined. “How about takeout?” Jake nodded. “Pizza?” He nodded again. “I’m really sorry. I don’t want to hurt you, please believe that I don’t want to hurt you.” Amy said and wrapped her arms around his waist. He put his arms around her in response and pulled her tight against him. This hug was for him, whether she meant it to be or not, he got to be selfish this time, Jake decided.

“Please don’t do that to me again,” Jake mumbled into her hair. 

“I won’t,” Amy said. 

  
  
  


 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry not sorry for the end of this chapter. Consider yourselves lucky though, because this chapter initially had a different ending! I hope you enjoyed it anyway!


	8. Comfort Factors

**Amy**

 

Amy felt guilt surge through her, she felt sick with it and she had an awful taste in her mouth. It had been a while since either of them said anything, Jake kept his arms around her, and she hated that she noticed he was shaking, she hated that she had done this to him. Amy mentally reprimanded herself, she had never meant to say that out loud, she really was curious if he would keep his word, if he would leave if she asked. It seemed that he would, but that it would also destroy him. Guilt flashed through her again, making her whole body feel warm. Jake didn’t show any signs of letting her go, and Amy was fine with that, she was glad to finally be there for Jake instead of him being there for her.

That was her intention in the first place when she had followed him into the kitchen. She had only meant to talk to him, to ask him to tell her how he was feeling, to ask him if there was anything she could do for him. The fact that he had been so great to her so far just kept rubbing it in her face that time really had passed, and that the man she thought he was is not the man he is now. He grew up, and it seemed, some of it was for her. But then he had manhandled her and she had found that she liked it. She found herself thinking of the snippets of memory she got back, the ones she didn’t tell Jake about yet. She always told him about the memories she got from work, or times they would just casually hang out, but it was the more intimate ones she kept to herself.

It’s not that she didn’t want to tell him, it’s that she felt she still hadn’t made up her mind about him and she didn’t want to get his hopes up. You have made up your mind, a little voice in her head said, you made up your mind years ago. But then it was different, she tried to tell herself. A much bigger part of her said that it wasn’t, that Jake was doing what he had promised he would, he was making her fall in love with him again. It seemed to creep up on her, and she couldn’t decide if it was because of the snippets of memories, or because she always would fall for him. Over and over again, she would fall for him. He had put his heart on his sleeve and showed all of his vulnerabilities to her, now it was her turn.

When he had made his little speech to her about loving her, her first reaction was to tell him that she loved him. A part of Amy didn’t understand why she didn’t, while another small part wondered if she just felt the need to say it because of what he had said. She truly didn’t think that that was the case. 

It was moments like that, when Jake let his feelings show through, when he acted normally around her, in ways she was sure was comfortable to him, even if it was a little new to her, when she was struck with the more intimate memories she could recall. One of them in bed, not having sex, just holding hands and talking about how their day had gone, and that one seemed the most intimate to her somehow. Another of them on the couch, his hand up her shirt as he kissed her slowly, gently. One of him playfully sticking his tongue out at her, and her retaliating by pulling his mouth down to hers, to put his tongue to better use. Of her standing in her underwear and him kissing his way down her body, leaving hickeys as he went, until he was kneeling in front of her, his fingers tracing the top of her underwear and glancing up at her, asking permission. 

Amy flushed for a moment, and was glad that Jake couldn’t see because he was still holding her. He always seemed to know when something was on her mind, and if he asked what she was thinking about, she didn’t think “you going down on me” was an appropriate response at the moment. 

“Jake,” Amy said as she rubbed her hands along his back, “you’ve got to let go so we can order pizza.” He shook his head and pulled her tighter. This was a part of him that was still a little immature, but she found it more endearing this time around. He sometimes had a problem with talking to her, so he let his actions speak for him, and while Amy appreciated it sometimes, it could also be frustrating in times like this. Times when she didn’t know exactly what he wanted, but he just wouldn’t let her go. “One more minute and then you have to let go.” She felt him rather than saw him nod. 

After a little longer than a minute, Amy knew she should let go of him, but she felt reluctant to pull away, especially since he was hurting, since she was the one who hurt him. She was a little relieved when he sighed and pulled away, because she didn’t want to have to force him to let go. As he pulled back, she saw that his eyes had gone red and it looked like he had wiped tears off his face, and once again Amy felt a surge of guilt. She didn’t know when he had started to mean so much to her, probably a long time ago, and getting her memories back was also letting those feelings filter in slowly as well. Without realizing what she was doing, Amy reached up to run her hand through his hair, but then quickly pulled away. Suddenly, she realized a little bit of how Jake must feel, wanting to touch her, but not sure that he had permission. All of the times he reached towards her and then seemed to abort, how at first it was natural, and then he realized what he was doing. 

“I’m going to call for pizza,” Amy said and pulled out her phone. Jake nodded and turned to the chicken that was still on the counter and went about putting everything away. They didn’t say anything as they both walked back over to the couch. As they sat down, Amy saw Jake glance into the corner of the room where the whiteboard and binders he had brought were, but he looked away and started to pull at a loose thread at the bottom of his shirt. After she made the phone call, Amy wanted to reach out to Jake, she wanted to lean against him and trace the scars on his hands. Some, she knew where they had come from, others Jake wasn’t even sure how they had gotten there. 

“Can I ask why?” Jake asked suddenly.

“What?” Amy said.

“Why,” he said and turned to her, she hated that his eyes were still red and a little puffy. “Why would you ask me to leave?”

“It’s stupid.”

“Please tell me.”

Amy sighed. “It’s just that, before, you had promised that if I decided I didn’t want you,” Jake flinched, “you would walk away, and a part of me wondered if you really meant it. But also, after kissing you, I felt overwhelmed, and I wasn’t sure what to do about it. I want to talk to you about it, but I want to talk to you as someone who actually remembers marrying you, as someone who remembers falling in love with you.”

Jake nodded slowly, took a deep breath, and then let it out. “Can I get off this emotional rollercoaster for just a minute, please?” Jake asked, rubbing at his face. 

“Okay,” Amy said slowly, “how?”

Jake turned to her and sat cross legged, and then waited for her to do the same.

“So you know how I’ve had to go back to work now?” Jake asked.

“Yeah,” Amy said slowly.

“I’m really tired of people asking me how you are and when you’re coming back, because I don’t know the answers to that myself. So Charles tries to help,” Jake said and smiled.

“How?”

“He tries to change the conversation, but you know him, he’s not very good at that stuff, so everyone tries to humor him. Somehow it still works though, because people don’t keep asking me,” Jake said. “The best is Gina though, because she’s decided that she doesn’t remember you until you remember her.”

“That’s not how it works,” Amy said, frowning.

“I know,” Jake said, “but Gina is Gina. Rosa doesn’t ask much, but I think she wants to. She says that she’s come over here sometimes when she knows I’m not going to be here.”

“She has,” Amy said and smiled, she wasn’t sure where Jake was going with this, but his voice had almost returned to normal and he was smiling a little again. 

“Do you mind telling me what you talk about?”

“Oh.”

“You don’t have to.”

“We talk about you,” Amy said, Jake blinked, and she was sure that wasn’t the response he was expecting. “Not always,” Amy clarified, “and Rosa keeps saying she doesn’t want to talk about relationship stuff with me, but she still puts up with it when I bring it up.”

Jake tilted his head to the side a little, and Amy was forcibly reminded of a dog looking confused, in an adorable way. “Okay,” Jake said slowly, “stuff you don’t want to talk about with me?”

Amy shook her head. “No, usually it is stuff I’ve talked about with you, I just want,” Amy hesitated, “a second opinion.” 

Jake smiled and rolled his eyes. “Detective first, huh?”

“You are too!” Amy said, and Jake shrugged. “You know she was the reason I called you that first day back. Yeah, I had every intention of not contacting you for at least a week, I was going to let you stay with Charles for a while while I figured out what I wanted. Rosa was the one who convinced me to lean on you.”

“Why?” Jake asked, “How?”

“I told her that I wanted to trust you, but I didn’t know if I should. She told me that so many people were telling me who to trust and who to talk to and who I was, but that I needed to trust my gut first. She told me to decide if I trusted you because I wanted to or because people were telling me to, and then go from there.”

“You trust me?” Jake asked.

Amy felt the need to roll her eyes and quip something witty at him, but she also felt like now was not the right time for that. “I do.” 

Silence fell over them and Amy wondered what Jake was thinking right now, if he was considering how much he trusts her, especially after the stunt she just pulled. When someone knocked on the door, Amy jumped in her seat and Jake laughed before he got up to answer the door.

“Thanks,” Jake said to the pizza delivery guy as he took the pizza and handed over a few bills.

“Do you want change?” the delivery guy asked.

“Nah,” Jake said, “Thanks.” He shut the door and walked back with the pizza. He put it on the coffee table and started to set everything up. Amy jumped up to help, grabbing plates for them both. When she sat back down, Jake was staring at the food in front of them. 

“What’s up?” Amy asked, looking at the pizza to see if something was wrong with it.

“Garlic knots!” Jake said, and pointed to them. 

“Yeah,” Amy said, laughing, “I know you like them.”

“I don’t think we ever talked about that,” Jake said.

“About garlic knots?”

“Yeah. That’s just something you remembered about me.”

“Huh, I guess I did. But you’re going to have to fight me for them,” Amy said and grabbed most of the garlic knots. 

“Hey, no fair!” Jake said, “There were six of them! Three each, Ames.”

“I got your weird pizza toppings for you, so I get most of the garlic knots.”

“If a lot of people didn’t like pineapple on pizza, they wouldn’t make it an option,” Jake said. “I can’t be the only one who likes it.”

“Okay,” Amy said, “but with spinach and beef on top? Gross, even if this is the only way I can get you to each vegetables.”

“Not true,” Jake said and started to reach over her to steal some of the garlic knots she had taken. “I eat more vegetables now, and not just in cake form.”

They bickered over the food as they ate it, and Amy finally felt relaxed. She had always felt comfortable with Jake, but this was something she felt she missed. Him messing with her and her retaliating, and both of them smiling as they do it. It had all felt so easy to her, so she wasn’t sure how it had happened.

The pizza was finished and the garlic knots were gone, Amy managing to eat most of them, although she was sure Jake had let her. Somehow Jake was lying down on the couch and Amy was sprawled on top of him, making out with him. He swiped his tongue along her bottom lip and she moaned a little, granting him permission. She didn’t fight him, she let him dominate the kiss, and she just enjoyed what he was doing. One of his hands was tangled in her hair, which seemed to be a favorite for him, the other was on her ass, at first she thought she might be uncomfortable with his touch, but she found that she only wanted him to touch her more. 

Amy suddenly thought of another time on this couch, Jake already shirtless and slowly pulling her shirt off too. The way that he ran his hands down her sides with a feather light touch, driving her mad because she wanted him to go faster. 

“It’s called foreplay, Santiago,” Jake had said as he unhooked her bra. “Ever heard of it?”

“Shut up, Peralta,” Amy had replied.

“Make me.”

And then she did. She had pulled off the rest of her clothes and crawled up his body and told him to do something useful with his mouth. “Yes ma’am,” he had said right before he kissed the inside of her thigh and then purposefully avoided where he knew she really wanted him.

Amy jolted back into the present, with Jake’s hands in her hair and now gripping her hip. She shifted her weight experimentally and he groaned beneath her. She could feel his erection against her leg, but she had no intention of doing anything about it, she wasn’t ready for anything like that yet. Amy hoped that Jake realized that, and she was sure he was, but she also knew he couldn’t completely control his reaction.

“Excited?” Amy whispered against his neck.

“Sorry,” Jake gasped out. “Uh, we can stop if you want.”

Amy pulled back quickly and Jake pulled himself back as well so they were both sitting on the couch again. The evidence of his arousal was still very obvious, but Amy followed Jake’s lead in trying to ignore it. 

“Will you sleep with me tonight?” Amy said.

“Uh,” Jake ran his hand through his hair, “no.”

“Not like that,” Amy said, trying to clarify, realizing what she had said. “I mean actual sleep. In a bed. You know, because you’ve been sleeping on the couch, and I’m sure you miss the bed. We can both agree to just stay on our sides of the bed.”

“Oh,” Jake said. “Yeah, that would be nice. I like the couch, but it’s not the best for sleeping on.”

“Wait,” Amy said, thinking back to what he had said before. “When you thought I mean sex, you said no.”

“Right,” Jake said slowly.

“Why would you say no?”

“Why should I say yes?”

“Do you not want to?”

Jake quirked an eyebrow at her and gestured to his crotch. “I’m pretty sure you know the answer to that.”

“So why then?” Amy asked.

“Because you still don’t remember everything,” Jake said, “and even though your memories are coming back, it’s not all there. And don’t get me wrong, I want to have sex with you, but I want you to want to have sex with me. I don’t want to do anything because you think you should, or you think it might jog your memory or whatever. And a few hours ago you asked me to leave after just kissing you, god knows what you’ll ask of me after sex.”

“I said I was sorry,” Amy said, guilt rushing back. “I really didn’t mean to.”

“I know,” Jake said. “It’s almost sad how quickly I forgive you.”

“You’re just excited that we’re kissing now,” Amy said. “And you don’t want to push it too far too fast.”

Jake nodded a little. “That’s cool though, I like kissing.”

 

When Amy got ready for bed, she kept wondering if she had made a mistake telling Jake he could sleep in the bed with her. She had put him through so much in such a short time, he must have emotional whiplash after the afternoon they had. He didn’t bring it up again, so Amy tried to do the same, even though she kept thinking about it.

If I asked him to leave, Amy thought, he really would. If I told him to go, to gather his things and not come back, he would do it. He would be devastated, he would be distraught, and he would be forever scarred by this whole experience. He had been hurt enough by people he thought had loved him. 

Taking a deep breath, Amy was determined to make sure that Jake didn’t have to go through that, but did that mean that she loved him? Or did it mean that she at least cared enough for him that she didn’t want to see him get hurt? She sat in bed, considering her options, trying to make a mental list, because a physical list wouldn’t do, she didn’t want Jake to see her making a pros and cons list of staying with him. 

After a few minutes of deliberation, Amy got back out of bed and walked into the kitchen, she made sure that Jake was still in the bathroom before she pulled off a post it and stuck it to the fridge. She looked at the other post its they had been writing back and forth, from the very first one asking for his help, to the most recent where she had answered him that she wanted chicken for dinner. They seemed to have gone back to what they were before, Jake and Amy messing with each other, and having little domestic conversations even though they could have just talked in person. Amy turned back to the blank post it she had stuck to the fridge and wrote, “I’m afraid to talk to you about some things. I shouldn’t be, and I might regret it later, but I want you to make me talk about it, okay?”

She had built up a wall around their relationship, because at first she was afraid of it, but now that she was learning how much she means to him, and him to her, it had become difficult for her to scale that wall. Any time that Amy could have brought up the things she remembered about Jake, she stopped herself, because it never felt like the right time. The problem was that if she kept doing that, it would never feel like the right time, and she knew that wall would stay there, and she’d end up continuing to hurt Jake. 

Amy walked back to the bedroom, not sure if she felt more or less nervous after writing the post it. Tomorrow was Jake’s day off, and she knew it was the coward’s way out to make him start the conversation, but she had found that she couldn’t do it. She was startled by a soft knock on the door.

“You can come in,” Amy said, and Jake walked through, smiling sheepishly at her. “You don’t have to knock on your own bedroom door.” Jake shrugged and walked around to his side of the bed. 

“I didn’t want to barge in or anything,” Jake said as he settled down. “Oh my god,” Jake groaned and spread himself out a little. “I forgot how good beds feel. Way better than couches.” 

“Good night, Jake,” Amy said as she leaned over to turn off the light.

“Good night, Ames.”

For a while Amy lay in bed and thought about how close Jake was to her now. How before they had been kissing, but this felt more important somehow, like how her memory of them holding hands and just talking seemed like the most intimate thing she had remembered so far. She felt an overwhelming urge to roll over and wrap him up in her arms, or the need for him to pull her close to him and leave his arms loosely wrapped around her and she could fall asleep in his arms. Once again, Amy knew that this was something she would have to initiate, because he had been avoiding initiating any physical contact with her the whole time. 

She didn’t move, she just listened as his breathing evened out and almost felt it as his body relaxed into the mattress. When she was sure he was asleep, she reached over to her bedside table and opened the drawer. She reached to the back of the drawer and pulled out the two rings that she had been staring at every night, contemplating putting them on. The entire time that Amy had been with Jake, he wore his wedding ring. A physical symbol of their relationship, and she was sure that Jake noticed that her rings were gone. As much as she grudgingly admitted it, she knew that Jake was one of the best detectives in the nine-nine. The way he thought things through was different from most people, but that seemed to be his best asset. She loved the way his mind worked, in a very different way from hers, but both intelligent in their own ways, both good detectives. 

Amy sighed and placed the rings towards the back of the drawer again and closed it. This was another thing, she thought, would never have a right time for it. 

She curled in on herself and listened to the sound of Jake’s even breathing, letting it lull her to sleep. 


	9. Let's Talk

**Jake**

 

An obnoxious beeping sound woke Jake up, and all he could think to do was groan and pull the pillow over his head to mute it. The beeping stopped and Jake relaxed, fully intent on going back to sleep, but someone was shaking his shoulder.

“Come on, Jake,” Amy said. “Wake up.”

“No,” Jake mumbled. “What time is it?”

“It’s eight,” Amy said.

“In the morning! On a day off? No, Amy, days off are for sleep.”

“Jake, get up.”

Jake sighed and pulled the pillow off of his head and sat up. He glanced over at her, she had the rumpled look of someone having just woken up, and she had massive bed head. “Morning,” Jake said and smiled at her. He loved waking up next to her, and he didn’t realize how much he had missed it the past few weeks. 

“Morning,” Amy said and smiled back at him. Jake wasn’t sure how to proceed now. Usually he would kiss her on the cheek and get up to make breakfast, even if it was just cereal for them both, and even though she had initiated kissing him twice yesterday, Jake still felt like he didn’t have permission to touch her. A part of him felt like it was his fault that Amy had kind of asked him to leave because he had picked her up without thinking, but he knew he couldn’t blame himself for that, and that Amy didn’t really mean it. It was the fact that it was something Amy still thought about that terrified Jake. He thought that he had come a long way in showing her how much she means to him, how much he thought he meant to her, and that maybe he really was succeeding in making her fall in love with him again. In light of recent events, he wasn’t so sure. 

Jake spent a lot of his time confused and overthinking everything. He had to consciously force himself to stop thinking about this as a case that can be cracked. This is his life, and as usual, something about it was messed up. 

“Jake?” 

Jake started and looked up, realizing that Amy’s hand was on his cheek, forcing him to look at her. He had been staring at the bed, not moving.

“Are you okay?” Amy asked as she pulled her hand away. 

“Yeah,” Jake said. “I was thinking.”

“About?”

“You, me, us,” Jake said, sighing and gesturing to the general space between them. “I keep thinking I’m doing okay, that we’re gonna be okay. And then something happens, and I blame myself, and I need to stop doing that.”

“You do,” Amy said. “What happened last night was my fault, not yours. Please stop blaming yourself for everything.” She hesitated. “You still blame yourself for me getting hurt, don’t you?”

“I just feel like I should have done something.”

“But you know there was nothing you could do.” Jake shrugged and Amy sighed. “You’re being too hard on yourself.”

“I’ll try to stop.”

Amy nodded and stared at him. Jake fidgeted under her gaze, but he waited for her to make the first move.

“I need you to stop that too,” Amy said.

“Stop what?”

“Waiting for me to do or say something. I know you’re trying to let me take the lead, but I need you to just be you.”

“Okay, so,” Jake said and moved towards her slow enough for her to reject him, but faster than he would if he were hesitating. He kissed her on the cheek and then pulled away. “I’m going to go make breakfast, but I don’t really feel like doing anything, so is cereal good with you?”

“Yeah,” Amy said, and Jake got up and walked out of the bedroom. He ran his fingers through his hair. He knew he kept pulling back every once in a while, and now he was afraid again, but he also knew he needed to stop doing that. He thought that he had over the past week, he thought he was acting normal around Amy, but he supposed she was right. He was acting normal in every way except for their physical proximity. They had gone back to joking with each other, teasing each other. Jake stopped watching what he was saying so much around her, but he still kept her at arm’s length away most of the time. 

“Baby steps, Peralta,” Jake whispered to himself. When he got to the kitchen he stopped dead, his brain automatically supplied: The scene of the crime. Jake rolled his eyes at himself and walked in, he was being ridiculous. He paused again at the fridge, but this time out of curiosity, there was a new post it stuck by the handle. After reading it several times, Jake pulled it off of the fridge and pocketed it for further evaluation. 

“Which cereals do we have?” Amy asked as she followed him into the kitchen. 

“Your gross bran stuff and lucky charms,” Jake answered. 

“That ‘gross bran stuff’ is good for you and you should have it every once in a while,” Amy said. Jake pulled down the two cereal boxes and frowned, Amy sounded slightly nervous. 

“Maybe one day, but today is not that day,” Jake said and turned around. He froze, for the third time today. God damnit, Peralta, Jake thought, get it together. Amy was wearing her wedding and engagement rings. Jake took a deep breath and decided to file that information along with the post it he had pulled from the fridge: for further evaluation. “Table or couch?”

“Couch,” Amy said. “I want to talk to you, and I don’t want it to feel too formal.” 

Jake nodded and grabbed both of their bowls, Amy reached for hers, but he pulled it away from her, smiling. “I got it.” She rolled her eyes at him and turned around. 

When they were seated and eating, Amy seemed to drift off. Which wasn’t like her, Jake thought, she’s usually the one to take charge.

“As you said,” Jake said, “I have to guide you, right?” Amy looked up, a little startled, but nodded. “So,” Jake pulled out the post it, “do you want to talk about this? Or do you want me to just talk?”

“You just talk,” Amy whispered. 

“You’re wearing your rings,” Jake blurted out, he hadn’t meant to be so blunt. “I wasn’t sure I’d see you wearing them again.” Amy nodded, but didn’t say anything. “How am I supposed to take that? Because I’m really inclined to think that you’re happy being married to me. You were, at least. I want you to be, because I love you, and I’m so happy with you. But if you’re wearing them because you’re guilty, I need you to stop that.” 

“It just felt right,” Amy said. Jake nodded and put down his cereal bowl. He sat with his back to the arm of the couch and pulled Amy to him, she didn’t argue, so he pulled her closer, her back against his chest, between his legs, and his arms around her waist. It felt good, it felt normal, and once again, Jake was letting himself hope. 

“You want me to make you talk about something,” Jake started. “But I don’t know what that something is.” Jake took the spoon out of Amy’s hand and ate some of her cereal. As he handed the spoon back to her, he couldn’t see, but he knew she was rolling her eyes at him. 

“I want to go back to work,” Amy said.

“Okay,” Jake said. “I think that’s actually a good idea, I don’t think you like just sitting around here all day, but you’ll probably be stuck on desk duty. Call Holt.” Amy nodded. “I know that’s not what you wanted to talk about though.”

After a moment Amy held up he left hand, showing Jake the rings on her finger. “I wanted to talk about these.” 

“What about them?”

“What they mean.”

“Okay,” Jake started. “What do they mean to you?”

“What do they mean to you?”

“I asked first.”

“I asked second.”

“Amy,” Jake said in a fake stern voice. 

“I don’t know what they mean to me,” Amy said. “And I think that might be the problem. I keep on not wanting to think about about it. I’ve forced out bits and pieces of our relationship because I didn’t want to think about them yet. I wanted to figure out who I was first.”

“Do you think you figured out who you are, then?” Jake asked, even though he thought it was ridiculous. As far as Jake was concerned, Amy was the same person, she couldn’t completely change as a person just because she couldn’t remember a few things. There was also the fact that she was starting to remember a lot of things now. 

“I don’t think I’ve changed,” Amy said, “I think I never stopped being me, I was just afraid that I had.”

“You’re ridiculous sometimes,” Jake said, “you know that?”

“What do you mean?”

“Of course you’re still you,” Jake said and rolled his eyes. He pulled her closer for a moment and kissed her shoulder. “A bit of memory loss doesn’t completely change who you are.”

“It could,” Amy said, Jake pinched her arm and she dropped the subject. “Okay, so then that brought me to how I know I must have loved you at one point, and for a while. I married you. So, what does that mean about how I feel about you now?”

“You tell me,” Jake said, and he tried to make it sound lighthearted, but he knew he failed. 

The couch creaked as Amy leaned over to put her bowl on the table next to Jake’s and then turned around to face him. “It’s strange,” Amy started. “I can’t really explain it because I don’t entirely know what it means, because I know I love you. I love you so much, but in some ways you still feel like a stranger, but that feeling kept going away and now I don’t feel that so much anymore. And if I could remember everything, I could probably see where and when I started falling in love with you, but here and now, it’s just there. I just know that I love you, and sometimes that confuses me because it’s almost like I don’t know why. And then you’ll do something like make me dinner, or go out of your way to recreate all these cases, or even from the very first day I came back. You put out clothes for me, ones you knew I would want to wear. Just because you wanted to help, and I don’t think you thought too hard about those things, you just did them.”

“I did,” Jake whispered and found that he had put both hands on her hips, and that he was probably gripping her tight enough to bruise, but she didn’t say anything about it. Her hands were on his shoulders and Jake was afraid to blink, because if he did, maybe all this would go away, he would realize he was daydreaming or something like that. “You love me?” Jake couldn’t help but ask, he wanted it so badly, and he was afraid of the answer. 

“The problem is,” Amy said, and Jake’s heart dropped. “The problem is that I haven’t talked to you about any of this, and that’s not how relationships work.”

“So,” Jake said, “you want to talk about it?” Amy nodded. “What do you want to talk about?”

For a moment all Amy did was open and close her mouth, as if she kept wanting to say something, but wasn’t sure of the best way to say it. 

“I’ve uh,” Amy said, “I’ve remembered some things that I didn’t tell you about.”

“Such as?” Jake asked. Amy’s face turned red, but she stared determinedly at Jake’s face.

“Having sex with you,” Amy said and for a moment Jake’s eyes widened, but then he smirked at her. Jake opened his mouth to say something, but Amy clapped her hand over his mouth and glared at him. “Be mature about this, will you?” Jake nodded underneath her hand. “I remember times on this couch and in the kitchen. I remember laying in bed with you, not doing anything, just talking, I don’t remember what about, but that somehow seemed the most important to me, the most intimate.”

“In what way?” Jake asked, genuinely curious.

“Well, I know I can talk to you,” Amy said, “about anything and everything. I want to do that.”

“You want to do that?” Jake asked, “Now?” Amy shrugged. “Okay.” Jake stood up and for a moment, Amy looked confused. In seconds, Jake had pulled Amy in to his arms and started carrying her towards their bedroom.

“Jake!” Amy said, wrapping her arms around his neck, fearful that he would drop her, but Jake knew he wouldn’t, and he thought she had to know that too. When he got to the bed, Jake dumped Amy on her side of the bed and he crawled over her to his side of the bed. Already under the covers, Jake held his arms open for Amy. “You just wanted to get back in bed.”

“I want to recreate moments for you, like I did with the cases, and if this is what you want, I’m more than happy to oblige,” Jake said, his arms still open for her, but she didn’t move. “C’mon, Amy, you told me to relax around you, you have to do the same for me,” he whispered and gestured for her to come closer to him. Amy sighed and pulled the covers over her as she slid into his arms. Immediately, Jake held her close to him and started to stroke her hair. Amy relaxed in his hold and rested her head on his chest. 

“I don’t know where to start,” Amy said.

“Why don’t you start with the memories you didn’t tell me about,” Jake said.

“Most of them are sexual in nature,” Amy said.

“Even better,” Jake said, smirking. 

The bed creaked as Amy adjusted her position, but she didn’t pull away from Jake, so he took that as a win. “I don’t remember everything,” Amy said, “mostly just certain bits and pieces. Like, I don’t remember how it started or how it ended, but I remember being in the kitchen and you going down on me. I remember being in bed, whispering to each other about  nothing as we made love. I don’t know how to feel about those things.”

Jake shifted against her. “Well,” he started. “How do you feel about them now?” Amy shrugged. “No, come on, Ames.You want me to make you talk about this stuff? So talk about it. Don’t try to assess how you think you thought about it then, what are your thoughts right now?”

“I liked it,” Amy said immediately. “And before, when I didn’t remember anything, those memories made me uncomfortable, because I felt like I shouldn’t know you like that. But thinking on it, really remembering, I love being with you.” 

At those words, Jake felt himself pull Amy even closer to him before he realized what he was doing. His hand was still tangled in her hair, and he was probably knotting it, but he didn’t care.

“Please stay with me,” Jake whispered into her hair. “I know I can’t make you, and you know I won’t stop you if you want to leave me. But please, stay. I can’t make you feel anything, and I don’t want you to stay for me, I want you to stay because you love me back. I don’t know what I can do here.”

“Keep being you,” Amy whispered back to him. “You’re true to your word.”

“About what?”

“You told me you were going to make me fall in love with you again.”

Jake hesitated. “Am I?”

“Yes.”

They both stayed silent for a while, enjoying the feeling of being in each other’s arms. 

“Hey, Amy?” Jake finally broke the silence. “Do you want to keep talking?” She nodded against him. “What about? More memories you didn’t tell me?”

“You didn’t tell me about the nuts,” Amy said.

“What?”

“On our first date that wasn’t really a date, you didn’t tell me that on the roof we were trying to catch nuts in our mouths.”

“I thought I did.”

“Nope, but I remembered it. I should’ve known then.”

“Should have known what?”

“How much you liked me.”

“But, I didn’t know how much I liked you then.” Amy pulled away to give Jake a stern look. “Okay, I knew I was screwed, but I didn’t want to admit it to myself.”

“You’ve matured a lot since then.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Jake said and shrugged. “I think I mainly stopped pushing my emotions away and started dealing with them instead.”

“The you that I remembered meeting before was someone I would think of as a friend, but I wouldn’t marry because I didn’t think you had any real goals in your life. But the you I see, and the one I’m starting to remember, I do believe that’s the man I married.”

“You’ll kill me if you leave me after saying all this,” Jake said, letting himself be open with her the way she was with him.

“I don’t plan on leaving.”

Once again, Jake found himself pulling Amy closer to him without thinking too much about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter is kinda short and not the best. I felt I was kinda losing the story line here for some reason, so somehow this chapter ended up just being a bridge to the next chapter. I hope you guys enjoyed it anyway!


	10. Nine-Nine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not going to have time to upload this later, so I'm doing it now, it's technically Friday, right?   
> Also, this is the first chapter I wasn't able to really edit before uploading, so I hope it's okay, I'll look through it and fix things later.

**Amy**

 

The past few nights, Amy fell asleep and woke up in Jake’s arms, and she had never felt more comfortable or happy. It took a while, partially because of Jake’s habit of smirking whenever she brought it up, but she started being a lot more open about her memories of their relationship as well. And for the first time, there were memories that Jake wasn’t trying to recreate, but a part of Amy wished he would.

This morning, though, Amy had a few other things on her mind.

“What if I suddenly forget everything all over again and we have to start from scratch?” Amy asked as she pulled on her sergeant's uniform. 

“Ames,” Jake said in the reassuring voice he’d been using for the past hour, “I don’t think it works like that. How would walking into the nine-nine make you forget everything?”

“I don’t know,” Amy said. “I haven’t prepared enough for this. I should have made a file on everyone and studied it. What if I forget everyone, or I don’t remember someone?”

“Almost everyone knows what happened, and they’ll be sympathetic,” Jake said, tying his tie. Amy watched as his hands deftly pulled the tie into place, working on muscle memory because it was an action he had been doing for years now. It wasn’t always something he did, she remembered, thinking of his fight against Holt when he first became captain. One time a tie around his waist, and at one point, Jake wearing a speedo. Without thinking, Amy grabbed one of Jake’s hands to pull him closer and kissed him.

“Thank you for putting up with me.”

“I’m always here for you,” Jake said and then kissed her briefly before pulling away again. “You’re always yelling at me that I’m making you late, but this time you’re making us late. I never thought I’d see the day.”

“Shut up, Jake,” Amy said. A visual check around the room was enough for Amy to decide that she must have everything she needed, even if she was nervous for her first day back at work. After a little bit of bickering and nudging from Jake, Amy had finally called Holt and told him she was ready to come back to work. And if Amy dragged her feet a bit with calling just so that she could have Jake constantly pushing her about it, it was something Jake didn’t need to know. She liked being around him, and she liked when he was pushing her towards what would help her. Sometimes it was just to take a walk around the block, because he knew she liked to do that sometimes, if only just to people watch. Every time Jake would complain about exercise, but Amy knew that he didn’t really mean it, and that he was happy to hold her hand as they whispered made up stories about the people they passed to each other. 

When Amy looked up, she noticed Jake was giving her a once-over. “You like me in my uniform?” Amy asked.

“Yes,” Jake said immediately, unabashed. 

“Hm, we’ll have to talk about that later,” Amy said. Jake quirked an eyebrow at her and then held out his hand, she easily took it and they walked out of the apartment hand in hand. 

Walking to work felt so normal to Amy, it felt like everything made sense and that was what was amazing about it. She thought that as she got closer to the precinct, she’d get more nervous, but she just felt the same. She wasn’t walking into a building where she didn’t know anybody, she wasn’t walking into something where she didn’t know what would be expected of her, or what she would have to do. There were people who were there to help her and support her, and if it came to the absolute worst, Amy knew that Jake would be right there for her. 

“Holt says you’ll be stuck on desk duty for a while,” Jake said, rambling to fill the silence. It seemed he was more nervous about her first day back than she was. “But that’s fine, because you like that boring paperwork stuff.” 

“Paperwork is important,” Amy said.

“You keep telling me.”

“Please tell me your paperwork has improved, because I vaguely remember a time when it was so smudged and poorly written that Terry had to rewrite almost everything you did.”

Jake laughed and squeezed her hand. “Yeah, it’s improved. I don’t want to let someone walk just because I messed up the paperwork. Which isn’t a word anymore, by the way, because we’ve said it too many times.”

“What, paperwork?”

“Yup, doesn’t sound like it could be a real word anymore, it must be fake. It must be made up.”

They walked into the building together and Jake gave her a quick kiss and a whispered, “Good luck, you’ll be fine, and I’m right upstairs if you need me,” before he let go of her hand and she got off the elevator. Before the elevator doors shut, she turned around to see Jake smiling at her and gave her a little wave. For a moment Amy stood still, staring at the elevator doors.

“Sergeant!” someone called out behind her and Amy put on a smile, ready to start the day.

 

Everything was much easier than Amy thought it was going to be, the more she did, the more she remembered, and desk work was the best thing she could have hoped for. When it came time for Amy to take her lunch, she hesitated between continuing to do work, or going up to see Jake. In the end, she decided that Jake would probably want to see her, and she would get a chance to see everyone else there too. 

When Amy first walked out of the elevator, for a moment, nobody seemed to realize she was there.

“Amy!” Charles yelled and jumped up from his desk. He immediately pulled her into a tight hug, and Amy could see Jake smiling from his desk. “How are you? What have you been up to? You do remember me now, right?”

“Yes, Charles,” Amy said. “I remember you. I don’t remember everything, but I’m pretty sure I’ve remembered all the people important to me.” Rosa gave Amy a slight nod, and Amy smiled at her in response. 

“Santiago,” Holt said as he came out of his office, “I’m glad to see you’re doing well.”

“Jake’s been keeping us updated,” Terry said as he moved in to hug Amy, “but how are you?”

“I’m well,” Amy said, looking around at the people who stood up to greet her. The only people who stayed in their chairs were Hitchcock and Scully, who weren’t likely to stand up unless they had to, and Jake, who seemed to be waiting for everyone else to have a chance to speak with her. “Hi, Gina,” Amy said, Gina had gotten up, but was still staring at her phone, she dramatically looked up, as if startled upon hearing her name. 

“Oh, you remember my name,” Gina said, “there may be hope for you yet.”

“Thanks,” Amy said and found herself constantly glancing at Jake for his reaction to her interactions with their coworkers. After talking with them all for a while, she found her way over to Jake’s desk, and he stood up when she got closer. “Do you want to go somewhere for lunch?”

“Sure,” Jake said and glanced around until he saw Holt, “Captain?”

“Be back in a hour,” Holt said and dismissed them as he walked back into his office. 

Jake slid his hand into hers as they walked towards the elevator, which prompted Charles to yell, “The golden couple is back!”

“Cool it, Charles!” Jake yelled back as the elevator doors closed, separating them. “He keeps wanting to go down and see you.”

“I think even Gina was happy to see me,” Amy said. “That never happens.”

“Yeah it does,” Jake said. “Gina just has a weird way of showing it.”

“I know,” Amy said. The grey interior of the elevator disappeared for a moment as Amy thought of a time she was laying on the floor, drunk, and it was Gina who gave her ibuprofen and glass of water, even helped her drink it because at the time, Amy wasn’t coordinated enough to figure that out. 

“So,” Jake said, “how’s your first day back going?”

“It’s,” Amy hesitated, “it’s going well.”

“Okay,” Jake said slowly, “are you alright?”

“I keep getting distracted.”

“What do you mean?”

“Everyone calls me ‘Sergeant Santiago’ here,” Amy said, her face scrunching up a little. “In the hospital I was annoyed they wouldn’t call me ‘Amy Santiago.’”

“Okay,” Jake said slowly, “so what’s wrong?”

“I thought I would miss my name, but being at work, people calling me by my maiden name, it’s not my name I miss, it’s yours.” Jake was silent for a moment, but when Amy looked up at him, she realized he was holding back laughter. “What?” Amy asked. “What?!”

“It’s just,” Jake said and laughed a little bit, “that’s almost exactly what you said after we got married. You said there was something you liked about taking my name, and it was strange to only hear it when people were talking about me at work, even though you knew that you kept your maiden name at work to avoid confusion.” Jake was looking at her with  _ that look _ again. The one that Amy couldn’t always place. It was gentle, and open, and caring, and looking back now, Amy couldn’t understand why she had ever found that look intimidating. 

As they walked into the deli, Jake let go of her hand so that he could go get them drinks while she ordered them sandwiches. It was clearly something Jake didn’t think about, something that they had done so many times before, and Amy was glad that she was starting to really remember their patterns, how they worked together. Them getting groceries, and how she would have to reign him in, especially in the baking isle, where he would want to get all the cake mixes. Them going to the library, and how most of the time Jake would just patiently follow her around until she found what she wanted, and he somehow had a way of not making her feel rushed, that he really didn’t mind spending time watching her pore through multiple books for hours. Them working cases together, and how they always seemed to know where the other was going to be, and how to have each other’s backs. 

For the first time it hit Amy how much it affected Jake when she got hurt, because at the time, they were in sync, they were not only partners who wanted to protect each other, but lovers who would always be there for each other. Not only did Jake feel that he failed her as a partner, but as a husband. A moment on the couch jumped into Amy’s head, Jake fidgeted and avoided eye contact with her as he told her his fears about marrying her, not that he didn’t want to, but that he was afraid he would be bad at it, that he would somehow become his father, and he didn’t want that. It had taken Amy ages to calm him down, make sure he knew that that wasn’t the case, and now, Amy realized, this incident had probably brought some of those fears back to the surface. 

Without realizing she was doing it Amy twisted her rings around her finger, she only noticed when Jake walked back to her with a smile, which faltered when he saw what she was doing.

“You don’t have to wear them,” Jake said, not looking at her. “It’s okay if you’re not there yet.”

“No!” Amy yelled, and then much quieter, “No, I want to wear them, really, I do.”

“Hey, what can I get for you?” the guy behind the counter called out, and Amy jumped forward to order. 

They didn’t say anything as they waited for their sandwiches, but Amy kept glancing at Jake, wondering what he was thinking. Well, there was one way to find out.

“What are you thinking about?” Amy asked. Jake turned to her, looking a little startled. 

“I didn’t tell you what I wanted,” Jake replied.

“Oh,” Amy said, “did you not want—”

“No, I did,” Jake said quickly, “I just didn’t have to tell you. I’m glad the little things are coming back, I think those are sometimes the hardest things to deal with, the nuances that you can’t always ask about.”

“Yeah,” Amy said. “Jake?”

“Yeah?”

“I like you.”

“I like you too,” Jake said, but Amy knew those weren’t the exact words he wanted to use. 


	11. Nine-Nine Part 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! I'm so sorry I didn't upload this on Friday! My computer broke last week and it's taken until now to fix it, for a while it looked like it couldn't be fixed and I was so scared that I'd have to get a new computer. Also, my laptop is finicky at best, and every time I tried to write on there, it slowed way down and I could barely get a sentence typed out. Once again, it's kind of a short chapter, and I haven't really edited it, so I hope there isn't any blaring typo and I'll have to read through it later. I hope you guys enjoy, and once again, I'm so sorry it's late!

**Jake**

 

Jake’s mind was racing. He didn’t have any open cases at the moment, otherwise he would try to distract himself with the details of it. Instead, his thoughts circled around and around, and all of them about Amy. For a moment, Jake smiled, because for the first time in a long time, he felt like a kid falling in love. Jake knew that he loved Amy, he loved her with everything he had, and as he had promised, he was going to make her fall in love with him again, he just didn’t realize that that would entail him falling for her even more. 

It’s not fair, was the first thought that came to his head, no matter what, I always seem to love her more. Jake shook his head and pushed the thought out, because he knew it wasn’t true. Of course, he loved her before she loved him, but that didn’t mean that he loved her more, he knew that they loved each other, and that was just it. Every once in a while Jake thinks about how he hates that he knew he loved Amy long before she even had romantic feelings for him, but it was she who confessed her love to him first. 

“Jake,” Amy said as she handed him his sandwich. “You’ve got that ‘thinking too hard about something’ face again.”

“That what?” Jake asked. He took the sandwich from her and they walked outside to sit and eat on the bench a little down the road. 

“You know,” Amy pressed, “when you think too hard about a case, or you’re overthinking your feelings on something, because I know emotions are still difficult for you sometimes. That look you get when you’re stuck in a thought spiral.”

“A ‘thought spiral?’”

“Are you just going to parrot everything back to me, or are you going to answer?”

“You didn’t ask me anything.” 

Amy shot Jake an unamused glare. “What’s got stuck in your head, Peralta?”

“Peralta?”

“Jake!”

“Sorry,” Jake held up his hands in defeat, “sorry. I just, I was thinking about… about the first time you told me you loved me.” 

“Oh,” Amy whispered.

“And about how much I love you,” Jake said, “because, I’m sorry, I do like you, but I love you more. And I know you know that I don’t expect you to say it back, not now, and that’s okay. I just couldn’t help but think how even though I loved you first, you were able to confess it first. I was thinking how this is kinda like my redo, my opportunity to tell you first.”

For a moment, the only noise between them was the ambiance of the city. “You’re an idiot,” Amy said.

“Yeah,” Jake said and took a bite of his sandwich, “you too, though.”

“Ew,” Amy said, “Don’t eat with your mouth full.”

“It’s not,” Jake said after swallowing, “do you wanna see full?”

“No, I do not, I already know that your mouth takes up seventy five percent of your face.”

“Ouch,” Jake said, but couldn’t keep the smile of his face, “that hurts.”

“The truth hurts, Jake.”

“Yeah, but you’re wrong, because my mouth only takes up seventy percent of my face, possibly less, have you seen my nose?”

“Alright, shut up,” Amy said and shoved him slightly. “We need to be back at work in half an hour.”

“Holt won’t care.”

“You know that’s not true.”

“Yeah,” Jake said and turned to her completely, “he tells me when I’m two seconds late, but now we have an excuse!”

“An excuse?” Amy asked, and even though her face looked skeptical, she had turned her body towards him as well.

“Yup,” Jake said, “like this: You suddenly thought you could remember something, but it was just out of your grasp, so you had to walk around, hoping it would come to you. And like the dutiful and dedicated husband that I am, I had to follow you. What if you suddenly forgot everything again? What if you got lost and could never find your way home? What if, and this is the real nightmare, you somehow found yourself in Manhattan!?” 

Amy snorted at him. “You like Manhattan, everyone does.”

“Yeah,” Jake said, “it’s cool, but it’s only really cool if you’re a tourist. Also, if you’re a tourist, you think it’s the only part of New York City. What if you somehow thought you were a tourist and forgot that Brooklyn is a part of the city!? Or, what if you went too far north and found yourself in Westchester?”

“Jake,” Amy said, “in this impossible situation, how do I mindlessly get on a train and into Westchester?”

“You were remembering how we planned me asking Charles to be my best man and how it started by me tricking him into thinking I wanted him to cover my shift so I could go to the White Plains mall.”

“Oh, clearly.”

“Yup,” Jake said, and leaned towards Amy, without thinking about it, he kissed her cheek, and he tried not to let himself think about it any more. “But you’re right, we should wrap these and head back.”

“I’ll take yours and we can finish the other halves for dinner tonight.”

“You do know there’s a fridge on my floor too, right?”

“Yeah,” Amy said, “and I also know there’s a Scully and Hitchcock up there too.”

“Oh my god,” Jake said, “you’re so right.”

“Maybe you’re the one who’s lost your memory.”

“It’s the crazy plot twist!” Jake yelled a little too loud, but none of the other pedestrians even glanced at them. Instinctively, Jake slid his hand into Amy’s and squeezed a little, she squeezed back and he couldn’t help the small smile on his face.

“You’re ridiculous sometimes, you know that?” Amy asked.

“You love it.”

“Strangely, I do.”

“Not so strange,” Jake said, and he suddenly felt the playful atmosphere between them dissipate into something else. 

“No, you’re right,” Amy said as they walked into the precinct. As usual, people greeted them as they walked by, and it struck Jake that some of these people didn’t even really know what had happened to Amy. Everyone knew that she had gotten hurt in the line of duty, but mostly just the people she works with knew that she had lost a chunk of her memory. Jake marveled at how Amy was still the same, even if she couldn’t remember everyone’s names, she still greeted everyone she made eye contact with. 

Watching Amy walk off the elevator while Jake stayed put gave him a strange sense of déjà vu. He knew that it was something he had experienced before, many, many times, but it still felt weird, as if there was something more to it, except this time, Amy didn’t turn around to look at him as the doors closed between them. The short ride up to his floor felt so much longer than Jake remembered it being, and when he got out, he hoped to just sit back at his desk and get some work done.

“Jake!” Charles called out as soon as Jake walked off the elevator. “How was lunch?”

“Fine,” Jake said, and smiled at Charles, but he knew that wouldn’t be enough for him to leave Jake alone. It was Charles who saw how much Jake had broken down when Amy had asked him to leave, and it was Charles who Jake called when Amy asked him to leave and then told him she didn’t mean it. For a moment, Jake wished he had the hindsight not to tell Charles things like this anymore, but he knew he still would because even if Charles was overbearing sometimes, he was still Jake’s best friend and he meant well. 

“Fine in a good way or fine in a bad way?” Charles asked.

“Can fine be in a bad way?”

“Fine can be in any way!”

“Peralta!” Holt called from the doorway to his office. 

Eager to escape Charles’ prying, Jake quickly made his way over to Holt. “Captain?”

“Have a seat,” Holt said and gestured to the chairs in front of his desk before he closed the door behind them. 

The room felt oddly quiet to Jake, it always did. The bullpen was always bustling with some kind of noise, people talking, papers rustling, the kitchen, Hitchcock and Scully eating. Jake had learned to tune it out, and the stark difference between the noise volume when the door was shut seemed otherworldly to Jake. 

“You and Amy seem to be doing well.”

“Yes,” Jake said hesitantly. “I hope so.”

“I was surprised that she did not ask to return to work earlier.” 

Jake tried to read Holt’s face, to garner whatever point he was trying to make, but as always, it was impossible. 

“We’ve been… working through a lot of things.”

“Charles tells me that she asked you to leave twice.”

“Charles!” Jake partly turned around in his seat to glare at Charles through the almost closed blinds. “It’s not a big deal,” Jake said and put a huge smile on his face. “There are expected rough patches, but we got this on lock.” Holt stared at Jake for a moment, and Jake couldn’t help but feel like Holt had some kind of x-ray vision and mind reading abilities that he was using to break Jake down. “It’s actually great,” Jake said, trying to fill the silence, “we’re doing awesome sauce.” He kicked himself mentally. Amy must be rubbing off on him, because he could bear all her silences and judgments towards him, but Holt’s silence felt like a nightmare.

“I care deeply for the both of you—”

“That’s the closest you’ve come to saying ‘I love you’ since my wedding, but I’m gonna take it,” Jake said. 

“Jake,” Holt said.

“Uh-oh,” Jake said under his breath, “not ‘Peralta’ anymore, now it’s personal.”

“Yes,” Holt said, “it is. I may not have seen Amy the whole time she has been out on medical leave, but I have been keeping an eye on you.”

“In a good way or a bad way?” Jake asked, briefly reminded of his conversation with Charles. 

“In a neutral way.”

“Can you watch someone in a neutral way?”

“We are getting off topic,” Holt said. “The point I wanted to get across is that while your work has not been impacted, you do not seem yourself. As your boss, and as your friend, I wanted to ask if there was anything I could do for you. I know I asked you several weeks ago, and you declined, and while circumstances seem to have improved, your demeanor has not.” 

Jake felt himself slump in his chair before he even realized that he was giving in to Holt. “I’m still scared.”

“Of what? Amy is very clearly improving and her memories seem to be gradually returning to her.”

“Of her leaving me. Captain, I don’t think I could take it. If this had happened a few years ago and she left me, I would have almost accepted it, but not now. And I know things are better, and I know she’s doing better, but a part of me is still afraid. What do I do if she leaves me?”

“She will not,” Holt said with so much conviction that Jake couldn’t help but believe him in a way that he couldn’t believe Charles or himself. “The two of you have always gotten along with each other.”

“Do you not remember the bet that we were in the middle of when you became Captain?”

“I remember it well, I also remember that upon Amy losing, your prize was a date with her.”

“A date she didn’t want to go on, and that I wanted to make horrible for her.”

“No you didn’t.”

Jake felt like a child at school being scolded by a teacher with the “I’m not mad, I’m disappointed” tone of voice, and he wished the teacher would yell and be mad instead. 

“You put a lot of effort into that date for Amy, you have always put a lot of effort into your relationship with her, especially when your feelings for her were not reciprocated, you made no attempt to seriously dislodge her relationships, and you even attempted a relationship of your own. And she, likewise, has put a lot into her relationship with you, do you want to know the details of that I noticed?”

“No,” Jake said quickly. He already knew, and he didn’t need Holt’s creepy yet accurate way of describing situations. “But that was the past and this is now, and the past is what she doesn’t even remember.” 

“It does not matter.”

“Of course it does!”

“No,” Holt said simply, “you chose each other because you work well together, as detectives and as people.”

“This feels like it’s become too personal and we have surpassed our quota of personal conversation for the next decade,” Jake said, trying to make a joke of it.

“You are not incorrect,” Holt said, but Jake still got the feeling that he was being analyzed. “Dismissed.” 

When Jake left the Captain’s office, he felt uncomfortable, yet weirdly reassured. Holt was the best detective Jake knew, and if Holt was so certain that everything would be fine, Jake felt a lot better about thinking it would be fine as well. 


	12. Reaction

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry this is so late, you guys! Once again, my computer broke. I really really hope I don't have to get a new one, but it isn't looking good. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter and I promise I'll do my best to get another one up by Friday!

**Amy**

 

At first Amy was worried that going back to work would be a little strange, but she found that it helped her feel more stable, and sometimes helped her remember little situations. She remembered the Halloween Heists in the middle of a briefing, and found herself fidgeting for it to be over so she could go upstairs and ask Jake if they still did the Heists.

“Yeah,” Jake had said, “and this year, I’m not helping you win, you’re going down! I haven’t won since the first year and it has been too long.”

“Oh no,” Amy had said, “I must have had a plan, but I don’t remember it!”

Jake’s eyes had gone wide for a moment, “You’re basically out of the running then! This is gonna be easy.”

“You proposed to me.”

“Obviously, that’s kinda step one in how we got married.”

“No, I mean you proposed to me on Halloween.”

“Technically it was November first.”

“Jake,” Amy had playfully chastised him. 

It was almost time for her to go home when someone, his name was on the tip of her tongue, but there were still people she couldn’t quite place, told her that Captain Holt wanted to speak with her. For a moment, she panicked, thinking she must have done something wrong, forgotten something really important. As far as she knew, though, she had forgotten everything important, for a split second, Amy was glad she didn’t have kids, because this would be horrible for them, and as hard as it was for Jake now, that would probably be harder. She shook those thoughts away and tried to rationalize. Captain Holt probably wanted to talk to her because it was the end of her first week back and he wanted to check up on her.

Amy greeted everyone upstairs on her way to Holt’s office, but the one person she thought she would definitely see, and was disappointed not to, was not at his desk. 

“He’s following a lead with Boyle,” Rosa called across to her when Amy had stopped in front of Jake’s desk. “They just left though, so they probably won’t be back soon.”

Out of habit, Amy straightened a few of the papers on Jake’s desk and then walked into the Captain’s office. The door was open, but she still knocked on it a little awkwardly. “You wanted to speak with me?” Amy asked in the doorway.

“Yes,” Holt said as he looked up. “Shut the door and sit down.” When Amy had sat down across from Holt, she expected him to start asking how she was doing, but for a moment, he just stared at her. “Have you found anything about your first week back challenging?”

“Oh,” Amy said, “no, yes, maybe? Sort of.”

“Which is it? Yes or no?”

“A little bit,” Amy said, and she felt like she had disappointed him somehow. “I know protocol, and I know the job, but it bothers me that there are people I should know, but I don’t.”

“A lot of them are people you met recently,” Holt said, “it’s understandable that they are not people you remember easily.” 

Amy wasn’t sure what to say to that, so she just said, “Thank you, sir.”

“I asked Peralta before, so I shall offer the same to you, is there anything I can help you with? It does not have to necessarily be work related.”

“No,” Amy said quickly and shook her head. “I’m good, it’s good, we’re good, everything’s…” She trailed off.

“Good?” Holt supplied and Amy nodded. “In which case, you should consider speaking with your husband, he seems to still have concerns regarding your relationship and your well-being.” 

“Jake?”

“Yes, unless there is something else you would like to tell me.”

“No! No, obviously Jake, who else would it be?” Amy knew she was getting flustered, she almost always was when speaking with the captain, but she was a little blindsided by his bringing up her relationship with Jake. She knew that Holt cared for them, that as much as they could be, they were friends, but she didn’t expect him to bring up Jake in this conversation.

“When he came to work after your accident, he was not performing his best,” Holt said. “He was much more concerned about you. Which case he could tell you about next, how to talk to you about certain things, and what he should do given the situation. He becomes very focused on his cases, sometimes it does not seem like it, but I know he always puts his all into what he is doing. The past few weeks, the only thing he can concentrate on is you. It is understandable, but I think he might need your help, and I am sure you are aware of how much he has helped you.” 

Amy got the feeling that he didn’t mean just since her accident, but long before that as well. She nodded slowly, he had been there for her this whole time, and this was her chance to be there for him, but that also meant that she needed to make a decision. Absentmindedly, she twirled the wedding band on her finger. It seemed a natural thing to her now, a habit she had picked up somehow, but didn’t remember when. She had put on the rings because she thought it was about time that she did. By all technicalities, she was married, and the rings were a symbol of that, there was also a part of her, a part that started out very small but has gotten much larger, that had put on the rings because it made Jake smile, and she liked it when he smiled. 

“So, Amy,” Holt said, “is there anything I can do to help you?”

“No,” Amy said, “thank you, sir.”

They sat in silence for a moment. 

“Dismissed.”

If Amy’s mind wasn’t cluttered before, it was now. She barely said goodbye to anybody before she left the building and headed towards her apartment. On the way there, she hesitated in front of several deli’s before deciding to get chinese take out. She didn’t know when Jake would be home, and she didn’t want him to have to make himself food if he hadn’t already eaten, and she didn’t feel like making anything either. 

The first thing Amy did when she walked through her front door was dump the food on the counter and then head to the bedroom to get changed into her pyjamas. When she walked back into the kitchen, Amy couldn’t decide if she should just eat, or if she should wait for Jake. Ever since Rosa told her that Jake had gone with Boyle to check on a lead, she had been glancing at her phone, hoping he had tried to contact her in some way. 

After some deliberating, Amy decided to put the food in the fridge and hope that Jake would be home soon so they could eat together. She had wanted to talk to him about some things for a while, but after her conversation with Holt, she wanted to talk to Jake even more. Amy pulled out her phone and stared at it for a moment before opening her texts.

 

**Amy:** I’m home. Rosa told me you were checking a lead with Charles, will you let me know when you’re on your way back?

 

For a moment, Amy hoped he would respond immediately, but figured Jake was busy with his lead. She wondered if she had gotten used to being in a relationship with another cop, if when she got all of her memories, she would still worry about him all the time. She hoped that she wouldn’t, but she knew that she would. Amy carefully put the phone face-down, so she wouldn’t be tempted to glance at it all the time, and looked around the room for something to occupy herself with. An old newspaper was sitting on the counter, and she pulled it towards her, she thought she had already solved the crossword puzzle in it, but she figured she could check over her answers to make sure she was right. 

Half way through the crossword, Amy heard the lock on the front door click and the door open.

“Jake?” she called out.

“Hey,” Jake called back as he shut the door.

“You didn’t text me.” Amy walked around to the front door to see that Jake was holding takeout bags. “I already got takeout, and if you had texted me, you would know that.”

“Sorry,” Jake said and smiled at her. As he walked past her, he kissed her on the cheek. “My phone died, and I just wanted something easy for dinner tonight, and I didn’t feel like making it.”

“I figured you wouldn’t,” Amy said, following him into the kitchen. “Which is why I got chinese takeout.” 

“Samesies,” Jake said, holding up the bag in his hand. “Did you eat already?”

“No,” Amy said, “I wanted to wait for you.”

“Oh,” Jake said and started pulling out containers, “thanks.”

“Should I not have?”

“No,” Jake said, “I’m glad you did.” He smiled at her, but it seemed a little forced.

“Jake, what’s wrong?” Amy asked.

“The lead went nowhere and Charles and I wasted too much time on it,” Jake said. “We’ve got nothing now.”

“You must have more than nothing,” Amy said. “What’s the case?”

“Healthy guy in his late thirties seemed to drop dead for no reason,” Jake said. “I think it was his brother, but he has an alibi. We thought we found a hole in his alibi, but it just lead us in circles.”

“You’ll figure it out,” Amy said, even though she didn’t know anything about the case, she did know Jake, and like Holt had said, Jake puts his all into his cases. It’s borderline unhealthy how much Jake puts into his cases, and while he’s gotten better at not letting them eat him alive, Amy still sometimes finds herself alone in bed while Jake is in the kitchen pouring over notes for a case, thinking he may have found something. “For now though, let it go, and you can go back to it tomorrow.”

Jake nodded, but he still seemed to be thinking too hard as he started to pull down plates. “Do we eat out of the cartons or do we eat like civilized people?”

“Cartons,” Amy said.

“Wow, Ames,” Jake theatrically put his hand over his heart, “I really have been a bad influence on you.” She didn’t respond, she just pulled out a fork and started eating some kind of dumpling from a carton. “You said you texted me, did you want to talk about something?”

“Yes,” Amy said, “but maybe now isn’t the best time. We should just relax and go to sleep, I think we both had a long week.”

“Okay,” Jake said slowly, dragging out the word much longer than necessary. “Do you wanna talk about your week? What’s it like, being back?”

“It’s refreshing,” Amy said, taking several containers and walked towards the couch, hoping Jake would catch on. When she glanced back, she saw Jake had grabbed the rest of the take out and was following her. 

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Amy said, but then hesitated. What did she mean? Was she happy to finally get out of the apartment and see people other than Jake? Yes, she was, but she still liked seeing Jake, and she knew that every spare chance she got, she sought him out, just so she could talk to him about how things were going. “Well, I’ve been telling you about how it’s been going as it all happens.” Amy let herself fall onto the couch, she leaned against the arm and propped her feet up along the couch, taking up the whole thing. Jake put the food down on the coffee table, and then moved her feet so he could sit, and didn’t say anything when she put her feet in his lap. 

“Yeah,” Jake said, “you have. But over all, how are you doing?”

“I like being back at work.”

“I thought you would. I didn’t think you liked being stuck in here all the time. You didn’t leave much, did you? You could have, you know.”

“I know,” Amy said. “But I also know that my life is here, and I kind of hoped that staying in the apartment might help me remember things quicker.” 

“How did that work out for you?”

Amy shrugged. “Well, I didn’t experience the alternative, so I don’t know which would have been better.” 

Jake nodded, and Amy noticed he was restraining himself from fidgeting. She suddenly thought of times when she had watched him from across their desks, playing with some kind of toy or knick knack. At first, she found this to be irritating behaviour and thought that it was time he grew up and stopped playing with toys. As she got to know Jake and his habits, some of which still disturb her, she realized that he has a lot of pent up energy that he needed to do something with. If his mind was occupied with something, he needed to do something about it, and if there wasn’t anything he could do about what was on his mind, he had to physically do something to distract himself. It was a part of who Jake was, and at first she wanted to change that about him, but now, it was something she found kind of endearing, still annoying, but she understood why he did it. 

“What is it?” Amy asked. Jake shrugged. “Jake, talk to me.”

“Talk to me,” Jake said. “You said you wanted to talk about something, and then decided not to. What do you want to talk about?”

Amy sighed, if this was what was on Jake’s mind, she knew she wasn’t going to be able to avoid it for long. “I talked to Holt today.”

“About how your week has gone?”

“Yes,” Amy said. “But we talked about you for a little bit too.”

“All good things, I’m sure,” Jake said. For a moment, Amy saw his cockiness show through, but it flickered away after a moment. 

“Nothing bad, exactly,” Amy said, and Jake frowned. “Holt said you’re not yourself at work recently. He said that you’ve gotten better, but that you were still holding back.”

“Hey,” Jake said. “No, I’ve been solving cases and kicking butt! I’m doing great at work! It’s just today that we had that mishap with the lead that wasn’t a lead.”

“I don’t mean like that,” Amy said. She put down the food she hadn’t really eaten and shifted her position so she was sitting next to Jake cross legged, facing him. “I didn’t want to stress you out when it seemed you had an already stressful day.”

“So you just didn’t want to talk about it?” Jake asked, and Amy nodded. “That’s not how relationships work.” She smiled at him, and remembered how that was what she had said to him. 

“You’re right,” Amy said, “it’s not.”

“So what is it?”

“Holt thinks that you’re still afraid that I’m going to leave you,” Amy said. Jake opened his mouth, but she quickly talked over him. “And Holt sees you all the time, and we both know that he’s the best detective anyone knows, so I don’t think he’s wrong. And I’ve noticed it too, but I didn’t know what to do or say because I felt like I still hadn’t made up my mind.”

“Oh,” Jake said and looked away from her. She put her hand on his cheek and gently nudged him to look at her.

“I was being an idiot,” Amy said. “I was letting both of us stress out and worry about, well, us. For a while I ignored how happy I was whenever you were around. I ignored how when you hugged me, when you held me when we started sleeping in the same bed, I felt like everything was going to be fine because I was with you. You were right before, you got your ‘do over’ and you got to tell me you loved me before I was ready to say the same to you. That’s the thing, though, it’s my turn now, and you didn’t make me wait so long after I told you I loved you for you to reciprocate. It’s not fair, but Jake Peralta, I love you. I love you so much, and you mean so much to me. I may not remember everything, I will still struggle sometimes, but I know it won’t ever be that bad because I’ll have you right there to hold my hand if I need it.”

Amy waited for Jake to react, to say something, do something, but he just stared at her, wide-eyed. Jake glanced down and Amy noticed that she still had one hand on his face, and the other had somehow started gripping his shirt.

“You mean it?” Jake whispered, and Amy realized that he was still scared to accept it, as if he was afraid that if he even blinked, this moment would disappear, that she would disappear. He moved one hand to where she was gripping his shirt, and she shifted so she was holding his hand instead. 

“I’m sorry it took me so long to say it,” Amy whispered, she was afraid that if she spoke too loud, something between them would break, and all of the progress they had made, all of the little touches between them would stop again. She knew she would miss how he kissed her in the morning, how he would put his hand on her back as he walked past her in the kitchen so that she would know he was there, how he brushed his hand against hers before he held her hand when they walked down the street. It was the little moments that had come to mean so much to her, all the ways that Jake told her he loved her without even saying a word. “I love you, Jake. I love you so much.”

Suddenly Jake’s mouth was on hers and he was pulling her close to him. Amy shifted her weight so she could straddle Jake, and tried to keep kissing him while she did it. She felt him smile into the kiss, and she nipped his lips in response. Without thinking about it, Amy pulled off Jake’s tie and started unbuttoning his shirt. One of his hands had found its way into her hair, while the other slipped under her shirt and against her back, pulling her even closer to him. He groaned underneath her when he realized that she wasn’t wearing a bra. 

“Did you know… did you mean to… was this your intention the whole time?” Jake muttered against her skin.

“No,” Amy said, and she felt Jake pull away a little bit. He had hiked up her shirt, most of her stomach was showing, but he hadn’t pulled it off. At that one word, he tugged the hem of her shirt down so it covered her stomach again, and moved both hands so that they weren’t touching her anymore.

“Do you want to stop?”

“Don’t you dare,” Amy whispered against his neck and tugged his shirt down his arms until he complied and helped her pull it all the way off. She ran her hands down his arms, and pulled his hands back to her body. “Keep going.” She felt him more than heard him moan against her shoulder. Almost immediately, he had his hands back under her shirt, this time he pulled it all the way off. She suddenly thought of a time when they walked into her apartment, before it became their apartment, and he had turned around and pushed her against the door. That was frantic and rushed and desperate, and that wasn’t what Amy wanted this to be. 

Amy pulled away slightly, and Jake responded by grabbing her hips and whining a little. He wanted this, and, Amy thought, he had probably wanted this for a long time. But, she also knew that he wanted her to want this. 

“You can change your mind,” Jake said through haggard breaths. “At any point, just say so.”

“I know,” Amy said and leaned into him, she caught his lips in a tender kiss, and every time he tried to deepen it, to quicken it, she forced him back down to her pace. So many thoughts were coming to Amy now, it was like when she finally sat down at her desk, and suddenly a lot of memories came to her, muddled and confused, but she remembered. That was what this felt like, but instead of images in her head of work and case files and people, it was all Jake. 

She remembered what she considered their first real kiss, the one in the evidence lock up, how he had just gone for it, and she thought of how a lot of how their relationship started was because of Jake, he was the one who kept putting himself on the line. She remembered how they broke a rule on the first date, and how she thought it might ruin everything, but it just felt right to her, being with Jake felt natural. She remembered how when they moved in together, he at first tried to respect that it was her living space, and it took him a while to ease into making it his living space too. 

Amy pulled away, taking a deep breath, her eyes still closed. 

“You okay?” Jake asked. His hands were on her waist, and when she opened her eyes, she saw that he was looking at her face, trying to gauge her reaction.

“Do you remember,” Amy started, “a few weeks ago when you started sleeping in the bed with me. At first the way I phrased it, you thought I meant sex and you said no.”

“Yeah,” Jake said, his eyes searching hers. “What about it?”

“You said that you said no because I didn’t remember everything.”

“I wanted you to want me,” Jake said. “I didn’t want to do anything just because. What is it that thing says? That consent is an enthusiastic yes. If you weren’t excited to have sex with me, but did it anyway, that doesn’t feel like consent, that feels worse than not having sex at all.”

“How did I get lucky enough to have you in my life?”

“You’ve got that backwards,” Jake grinned at her. 

“Hey, Jake?”

“Yeah?”

“What would you consider an ‘enthusiastic yes’ to look like?”

“I think it can look different depending on the situation. What do you think?” Jake asked. He was smiling so much, and his hands had stayed where they were, and Amy could see the emotion on his face. 

“This,” she whispered before she pulled him into a kiss. At first Amy didn’t notice that Jake had shifted a little, and that his hands were gently trailing along her body. Still, every time Jake tried to deepen the kiss, Amy pulled back. After a few more attempts, Jake groaned and Amy felt him grab her butt and he stood up. She was quick to wrap her legs around his waist, and tighten her grip around his neck, and she was glad that the bedroom wasn’t that far away. 

Jake dumped her on the bed, much like he did before, the morning after he finally got to sleep in his own bed again. Except this time, he didn’t move around her, he crawled up her, kissing her as he went. He stopped at her hips, kissing along the the waistband of her pyjama bottoms, and then slowly trailed upwards. Once again, he stopped, this time at her chest, he took his time sucking and nipping one nipple before switching to the other one. His hands roamed her body the entire time, trailing gently up her sides, making her shiver. 

“What do you want, Amy?” Jake asked, he had continued his trail up her body, and was carefully sucking a hickey into her neck. Amy would normally protest, she didn’t want the possibility of trying to hide a hickey at work, but his mouth felt so good on her that she couldn’t bring herself to tell him to stop. “I want you to feel so good, tell me what you want.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I suck ending it there! I'm sorry, I just felt like the chapter was getting too long, and I had started to feel like it should have ended earlier than it did.


	13. Together

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Sorry I've been AWOL for a bit, I had some pretty serious personal stuff going on involving hospitals and everything. But don't worry, it should all be fine now. That stuff happened a few weeks ago, and then I found it difficult to write, but now I think I've gotten back into the swing of things! Anyway, I think this fic might be almost done, I'm trying to see where it takes me, but right now I think there are only a few chapters left, but I don't want to put anything definitive down yet. This is also unedited, so I hope it's okay, please enjoy!

**Jake**

 

Jake could feel his heart pounding, he could hear his blood rushing through his ears, and he didn’t want to look, but he was sure his hands were shaking. He had had sex with Amy for the first time in over a month, and everything was exactly how he remembered and different all at once. But by now, she had fallen asleep in his arms, curled into him.

“I love you,” Jake whispered into her hair. “I love you so much.”

The room was dark and quiet, and for the first time in a long time, it felt like a normal night to Jake. He fell asleep with his mind clear and and his wife tucked into his side.

 

“Jake, you need to wake up, because I need to get up.”

Jake slowly returned to consciousness, he must have turned over in his sleep, because now he was partially on top of Amy and their legs were tangled together and stuck in the sheets.

“Hm?” Jake asked, trying to mentally shake away his sleepiness. 

“I need to go to the bathroom, and I can’t get up because you’re on top of me,” Amy said.

“Oh,” Jake said and rolled over, but it just further tangled the sheets. 

“Why do you move around so much in your sleep?” Amy asked.

“I don’t always.”

“You do enough.”

“Does it annoy you?”

“No,” Amy said when she finally freed herself from the sheets and stood up. “Sometimes it’s just inconvenient.” Jake propped his head up with his hands, and watched Amy move to walk out of the room, completely naked. “Quit staring, pervert.”

“Is it perverted if you’re my wife? I don’t think so,” Jake called after her. 

“Shut up,” Amy called back. 

Jake waited a few minutes before he got up as well. The room was quiet, at least as quiet as an apartment on a New York City street can get, and Jake smiled to himself. He padded out of the room and heard that Amy had turned the shower on, he contemplated knocking on the door, but then passed it and walked into the kitchen. Jake stood in front of the counter for a moment before he pulled out one of the post its, wrote “I love you” on it, and stuck it to the fridge. 

When Jake passed the bathroom again, he could hear the shower was still running. He knocked on the door and called through it, “Ames, leave some for the fishes!”

“Shut up, Jake,” Amy yelled back.

“Nope,” Jake said as he opened the bathroom door and slipped inside. “Hurry up, or I’m joining you, I need to take a shower too.”

Amy peaked around the shower curtain and glared at him, but he just smiled back at her. “Get out, Jake. Wait your turn.”

“Uh, nope,” Jake said and stepped into the shower with her. He nudged her aside so all of the water was falling on him, and she was left in the cold.

“Jake!” Amy pushed him until she was under the water a little as well, he chuckled and wrapped one arm around her waist and kissed her temple. “This is so uncomfortable and inefficient.”

“You’re right,” Jake said, “but it’s too late now, I’m here. You could just get out.”

“I’m not done yet,” Amy said and reached around for the body wash, Jake saw her hesitate before she grabbed hers.

“You can use mine if you want,” Jake said, and Amy turned to him, wide eyed. “You’ve been using mine whenever something big happens. Last night was big.” He winked at her and she rolled her eyes.

“You noticed that?”

“Amy, I am the best detective at the nine-nine, of course I noticed.”

“I thought we agreed that the best detective is Holt.”

“Whatever,” Jake said. “But yeah, I knew you were doing that, but it’s not something you’ve done before. Why have you been using it? I don’t care that you are, I’m just curious.” 

“I think I didn’t use it before because I like you smelling like you,” Amy said, Jake saw her blush and smiled. He kissed her and then waited for her to continue. “Scents are really good at triggering memories, if you associate a smell with something, then you’re likely to remember it when you experience that smell again.”

“Really?” Jake asked, and Amy nodded.

“You make me feel relaxed, like everything is going to be okay. So sometimes I wanted to use your body wash because I associate it with you, and even if you weren’t with me, every once in a while I could smell it, and I felt better,” Amy said, Jake just stared at her, he wasn’t sure what to think or how to process this new information. “It’s not the same as when you’re actually there, I prefer when you smell like you and I can be held by you and just listen to your heartbeat, listen to you breathe.” 

Amy looked up at Jake, and he had no idea what his face looked like, but he was sure he was staring at her in awe. “Ames.”

“I’m sorry,” Amy said and turned around. She grabbed her own body wash and then looked like she was trying to hurry to finish and get out of the shower. “I shouldn’t have said any of that.”

“No, Ames,” Jake said and tried to either maneuver around her or get her to face him, but it was difficult in the cramped space of the shower. These things really aren’t built for two people, Jake thought. “You know that works both ways, right?” She finally turned back around. “I like it when you hold me too, I like being the little spoon, it feels safe and comforting. And I like it when I can listen to your heartbeat too. When you were in the hospital, before you woke up, it was almost reassuring to hear the monitor beep along to your heartbeat, but it wasn’t the same as hearing it myself.”  

For a moment, Amy stared at Jake, and didn’t move. He waited for her response, and unlike the many times since she had lost her memory, where he waited, terrified, that this was it, he had ruined everything forever, this time he waited, content, and sure of his relationship. At this point, Jake was sure Amy wasn’t going to leave him. And it wasn’t the sex, it was because he had stopped to try and realize for himself what Holt was telling him. It didn’t take as long as last time, but Jake was sure he had succeeded in getting Amy to fall in love with him again. Granted, this time around, he had the benefit of already being married to her, their relationship already publicly what it was, and his own hindsight. 

“I hate you,” Amy said and went about shoving Jake out of the way to rinse the soap of her own body wash off. For a moment, Jake watched as water and soap trailed down Amy’s body before he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her shoulder. At first Amy tried to struggled away from him, but he knew she wasn’t really trying, so he didn’t let go.

“No,” Jake said against her skin, “you don’t.”

Amy sighed and leaned back against Jake, and he took that as an invitation to let his hands roam. He found the hickey that he had sucked onto her neck last night and put his mouth over it, wondering if he could make it any darker. He felt a slight surge of possessiveness, and he knew he didn’t own Amy, he didn’t want to either, but she was his, in the same way that he was hers. She tilted her head to the side, allowing him better access to the mark on her neck, and he chuckled. Jake knew that Amy would complain about it later, but he would worry about it when she brought it up. If she brought it up. 

“You’re right,” Amy breathed, “I don’t.”

Jake slowly moved both hands up, feeling her warm skin, tracing the small scars on her abdomen, until he was cupping both of her breasts. Jake gently swiped his thumb over one of her nipples, and Amy let her head fall back against Jake’s shoulder. 

“This is not the best place,” Amy said, but she didn’t try to move at all.

“No,” Jake said, “it’s not.” He trailed his hands slowly back down her body and wrapped one arm around her waist to try and help support her, while the other continued lower. Jake had reached Amy’s thigh and was gently nudging her leg to give him room.

“We shouldn’t do this here,” Amy said, but still didn’t move, still didn’t pull away from him. Jake made a noncommittal noise and pulled away enough to maneuver Amy against the wall while he dropped to his knees in front of her. Immediately, Amy’s hands found their way to his hair and his shoulder, and Jake pulled one of her legs over his other shoulder. Both of his hands were on her hips, trying to keep her in place, and he kissed the inside of her thigh. Water was spraying into his face and over both of their bodies, but Jake ignored it and closed his eyes. He took his time teasing her, his fingers gently tracing circles on her hips and lower stomach while he slowly kissed his way up her thigh. When he got close to her center, he stopped moving and concentrated on the inside of her thigh, with every intention of giving her a hickey there. 

Jake liked to see the little bruises on Amy’s skin after they had had sex. He didn’t like hurting her, and like before, he didn’t mean in any way to lay claim to her, but he liked the way the animal side of him felt that the mark meant “mine.” And while Amy would never admit to it in words, Jake knew that she liked it as well. She like receiving them, not giving them, but Jake thought he would be fine with either. He pulled away and opened his eyes slightly, trying not to get water in them, to assess his handiwork. He smiled slightly and nipped at her skin, she pulled his hair and he groaned.

“Jake,” Amy sighed, “please stop.”

“Stop what?” Jake asked. “What part of this do you want to stop?”

“Teasing me,” Amy said.

“Okay,” Jake said and gently sucked on her clit. She groaned and Jake heard her head fall back and hit the wall, and he couldn’t help but smile against her. It didn’t take long for Amy to climax, and Jake did his best to support her weight, but when she opened her eyes again, they were both on the floor of the shower and the water running over them was getting cold. 

Amy leaned forward and pulled Jake into a kiss, he moaned against her mouth. At first Jake didn’t realize Amy’s hand trailing down his stomach, he was too distracted by the kiss, and he gasped when he felt her fingertips at the base of his dick. Before he could think to hard about it, Jake grabbed her wrist and pulled her hand away. “Later,” Jake said.

“What about you?” Amy asked.

“Later,” Jake said again. “Why don’t you get out before the water gets too cold. I’ll finish up and then we can have breakfast. What do you want?”

“I don’t know,” Amy said, “but can we have another casual couch breakfast so we can talk.”

“I feel like we use the actual table less and less,” Jake said and Amy shrugged in response. “Okay, why don’t you go get it started?”

“Me?” Amy said, “You want me to start something? I’ll probably just burn it.”

“Let’s just have cereal, and if you manage to burn that, I won’t be mad, I’ll just be impressed.”

Amy rolled her eyes and smiled at Jake before she carefully stood up, trying not to slip. Standing outside of the stream of water, Amy tried to wring out her hair before stepping out of the shower. “Why do I feel like we agreed to never try to have shower sex again?” Amy asked over the sound of the running water.

“Because we did,” Jake said. “Not enough space and the bed is more comfortable anyway. I kinda forgot.” 

“Of course you did,” Amy said, and Jake heard the bathroom door open and close. For a moment Jake stood under the cold water and smiled to himself, he didn’t think about what he was going to do before he did it. That was something Amy had been asking him to do for ages, but for some reason he had found it difficult. Talking to Holt and then talking to Amy helped Jake settle back into his life, he wasn’t worried anymore, because he knew that no matter what happened, even if Amy didn’t remember anything, she was still going to be by his side. Jake rushed through the rest of his shower, trying to decide whether it was better to be out of or under the stream of cold water. 

When Jake got out of the shower, he rubbed his hair as dry as the towel could get it before he went back to the bedroom to throw on some sweats and a shirt. He walked into the kitchen to find Amy in leggings and her NYPD sweatshirt. “Uh oh,” Jake said as he grabbed one of the bowls Amy had prepared on the countertop. “Comfort clothes. Is this regret over last night, or preparation for a conversation now?”

“No regret,” Amy reassured him and kissed his cheek. “I guess a little bit of conversation.”

When they had gotten settled on the couch again, Jake waited for Amy to say something, but she seemed determined to eat her cereal first. So they ate in comfortable silence, at least, it was comfortable to Jake, he wasn’t too worried about what Amy was going to say, he didn’t worry anymore, because he was sure he didn’t have to anymore.

“My parents called the other day,” Amy said and put her bowl down.

“Okay,” Jake said and mimicked her movement, placing his bowl out of the way as well. 

“Have you noticed that we always eat on the couch and then talk and something always happens?” Amy asked.

“I guess,” Jake said, “I didn’t really think about it. What does that have to do with your parents calling?”

“My dad wanted to know how I was doing,” Amy said. “And then he wanted to know how you were doing. I ended up having a long conversation with him about you.”

“Do I like this or do I not like this? What reaction should I be having right now?”

Amy smiled at him and tugged on his shirt, getting him to lay down on the couch so she could lay down behind him. Jake instantly melted into Amy, he loved having her arms around him, he felt safe and cared for. “He just wanted to know how things were going between us, if everything was okay. I ended up asking him some questions I don’t think I asked him before.”

“Like what?” Jake asked, and noticed that his words seemed slightly slurred, he was so relaxed that he couldn’t help but feel a little sleepy. 

“Like what he really thought about you and our marriage. I know he didn’t like you at first.”

“No one ever does.”

“That’s not true.”

“How long did it take before you liked me? Not romantically or anything like that, just as a person.”

“I can’t remember,” Amy said.

“Sorry,” Jake said, “I didn’t mean—”

“No, I know,” Amy cut him off before he could work himself in a spiral, and he knew she was waiting to feel him relax back against her. “I didn’t mean that I still don’t have those memories back, I mean that I think it all happened gradually. I started to realize that under all the false bravado and immaturity was a caring and loyal man. I started to realize that you picked on me because I was an easy target, but that also because you liked how I reacted. I think it was that you slowly grew on me, and where most people would stop, and it would stay as friendship, I kept liking you. That might be why it took me so long to realize I liked you, because it happened so slowly, that when I realized it, it felt like I was in too deep.”

“I think it was the same for me,” Jake said. “It just kinda happened. The only difference is that I liked you from the beginning. I found your incessant need to be organized and by the book annoying, but also I respected that about you. And you know it was difficult for me to be genuine a few years ago.”

“Yeah, and now because of me you use words like ‘incessant’ and ‘genuine.’”

“Ugh, I take everything back, I hate you.”

“Jake?” Amy said, he made a vague noise telling her he was listening before she continued. “I wanted to talk about how you were doing. Most of the time we talk about how I’m doing, but right now I want to talk about you.”

“Ah,” Jake said, “so that’s what your parent’s phone call has to do with it.”

“Don’t change the subject,” Amy said as she hooked a leg over his hip, encompassing him even more. “This whole thing must have been extremely difficult for you, especially considering your abandonment issues.”

“I don’t have abandonment issues,” Jake mumbled.

“Jake,” Amy said sternly and Jake sighed in response.

“Yeah,” Jake said. “You know I was terrified all the time that you were going to leave me. And you knew that I wasn’t going to stop you. That’s the big difference here, when my dad left, I had no power to stop him, I couldn’t do anything about it. But if you left, I could beg you to stay, I could do all these grand gestures or whatever, and I might have possibly guilted you into staying with me, which wouldn’t have been healthy for either of us. So I knew that even though I could do something, I wasn’t going to, and resigning to doing nothing felt worse than not having the ability to do anything.”

“Because you would have felt like you could have done something, that you should have done something,” Amy whispered, Jake felt her breath against his neck and nodded in response, he found that despite the conversation they were having, he didn’t feel insecure, like he was sure he was going to. Jake felt safe because Amy’s arms were around him and she wasn’t letting go, he felt like, finally, she was holding on to him as tight as he was holding on to her. “It’s a good thing that it didn’t come to that, and that it’s not going to.”

Jake nodded and shifted his weight slightly so he could reach around to the back of the couch where he knew a blanket was. “We’re gonna be here a while, aren’t we?” Jake asked, but he didn’t need a response. 

“I saw your note on the fridge,” Amy said.

“Which one?”

“The ‘I love you’ one,” Amy said. “I love you, too, Jake. I love you so much.”

“I never used to think it would be so easy to tell someone I loved them,” Jake said. “It always felt like a struggle with everyone except my mom.”

“You showed it without saying it,” Amy said. “You have a habit of doing that still. Sometimes you might be saying something teasing, but it’s your actions that count.”

“Sorry about that.”

“Don’t apologise,” Amy said, “I know.”

They were quiet for a while, Jake didn’t know how long, but it was the comfortable kind. Jake had almost drifted back to sleep when he felt Amy shift her weight a little. 

“Do you wanna get up?” Jake mumbled.

“No,” Amy said. Jake had almost completely relaxed again when he felt Amy’s hand slip below the waistband of his sweatpants.

“Ames,” Jake said, he wasn’t sure what he was trying to say. 

“Do you want me to stop?”

Jake chuckled a little, that was his line. “No.”

“Good,” Amy said, “because I think it’s later now.” 


	14. Date Night

**Amy**

 

Memories had stopped flooding Amy’s mind whenever something happened, she felt that she had reached a point where either she remembered what had happened in her life, or she just wasn’t going to remember anything else. So it started to be a surprise when more memories would come to her mind. At this point, she wasn’t too concerned, because she felt she remembered what was important, meeting her friends, marrying Jake, most of her big cases at the nine-nine, and even the little things in between.  

Laying behind Jake and holding him was one of those times, even before they were in a relationship, of times when she was there for him, times when he didn’t expect her to be. She knew it had happened, but it was the first time she remembered for herself the moment Jake had told her that she wasn’t allowed to fall in love with him, and how quickly but wrongly she had declared that that wouldn’t be a problem. And the first time she remembered when Jake had admitted he had feelings for her, and the times after that when he made it clear that he had no intention of seeking a romantic relationship with her because he knew that wasn’t what she wanted. 

Every step of the way, Jake had been a supportive friend first, and Amy was surprised by how long it took her to realize that. Although, she also acknowledged that if it wasn’t for Holt becoming their captain, Jake might have taken even longer to mature, and that might have made it take longer for them to begin a relationship as well. 

“I hate you,” Jake mumbled, and Amy only barely caught what he said.

“Why?”

“Because now I have to go change my pants and clean up and I was so comfortable just lying here.”

“You weren’t complaining five minutes ago.”

Jake huffed and rolled out of her grip, he walked around the sofa and out of her sight. Amy took the opportunity to stretch out on the couch, taking up the whole thing. It didn’t take long for Jake to reappear and proceed to force his way onto the couch so Amy was between him and the back of the couch. She automatically wrapped her arm around him and hooked her leg up over his hip.

“Nothing inappropriate now, Santiago,” Jake mumbled, “I know you find me irresistible, but I’m just a man.” 

“It’s not ‘Santiago’ anymore, is it?” Amy chose to concentrate on that part of the sentence and ignore the rest. Jake tensed up a little.

“I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable, you know?” Jake said. “I didn’t want to force you into anything.”

“When you gave me that speech ages ago, when we were sitting on the kitchen floor,” Amy started, Jake squirmed a little, uncomfortable, “you said ‘Amy Santiago’ when you were talking to me. I didn’t think about it then.”

“You would have noticed if I said something else.”

“You mean if you had said ‘Amy Peralta?’”

Jake nodded and turned around, he tucked his face into the crook of her neck and tangled their legs together. “I was terrified of pushing you away.”

“I know you were,” Amy said and started carding her fingers through his hair. This felt like the memory of holding hands and talking in bed, to Amy this was intimate, but not sexually charged at all. They were both content, and this was a version of Jake that Amy liked a lot, the man who silently and comfortably bared his soul to her, he trusted her with every fibre of his being, and she knew that no matter what Jake said, she was so lucky to have him in her life. Even if they had just remained friends, Amy knew that no matter what, Jake would be there for her. 

“I was thinking the other day,” Amy said, Jake hummed against her skin to let her know he was listening, “I was thinking of how selfish I could have been.”

“In what way?”

“If I had told you that I didn’t want to be with you anymore,” Amy said and Jake tightened his grip on her waist, she kissed his temple and rubbed his back to tell him that that wasn’t going to happen. “I would have still wanted you in my life, I would have asked you to stay my friend. I think that would have been worse for you, but you would have done it. You would have let me divorce you and then ask you to stay in my life and watch as I possibly found another man and fell in love with him, married him, and you would have just watched, telling me the whole time that you were fine and that you just wanted me to be happy, even if you weren’t fine.” 

Jake nodded and took a deep breath. “Can we not talk about this?” he asked. 

“Do you need me to tell you point-blank that I’m not divorcing you?” Amy asked, Jake didn’t respond, so she continued. “Because I’m not. I told you, I love you, and I want to be with you for the rest of my life, you, Jake Peralta, are the right person for me.”

Amy felt Jake smiled against her skin. “That’s kinda what you said at our wedding.”

“I kinda remember it,” Amy said. 

“Amy Peralta,” Jake whispered, and Amy could still feel his smile, “you are everything to me.”

Amy kissed his temple again, and she didn’t know how much longer they stayed in that position in a comfortable silence, but she knew it was for a long time. 

 

“Hey Ames!” Jake called from the kitchen, at least, Amy assumed it was the kitchen. “What do you want me to make for dinner?”

“Why don’t we go out?” Amy called back. “We haven’t gone out in a while.” She was folding laundry, because Jake had gone to do the laundry and then dumped the clean clothes on the bed with the excuse that he needed the laundry basket for more laundry, and she couldn’t stand the pile of clean clothes getting wrinkled. 

“Date night?” Jake asked, Amy looked up to see he was now leaning against the doorway into the bedroom. There was a small smile tugging on his lips and Amy felt the sudden desire to kiss it off of him. The small smile turned into a grin when she was sure he had noticed where he attention was. 

“Yeah,” Amy said softly, “date night.”

“Dinner and a movie?” Jake asked as he walked into the bedroom to help Amy fold the clothes. He wasn’t as precise as she was with it, but he was trying and Amy appreciated that. 

“What movies are out right now?”

“Not a clue.”

“Okay,” Amy said, “how about we keep it simple? We go to a small restaurant, and then come home and Netflix something.”

“Netflix and chill?” Jake asked and Amy smacked his arm. 

“No, just Netflix.”

“Are you saying that there will be no chill?”

“Not with you.”

“Ever?”

“Jake!”

“Sorry,” Jake said as he folded the last shirt. “So, date night, but a simple date night?”

“Yeah,” Amy said. “Is that okay?”

“It’s fine with me,” Jake said and leaned down to give her a quick kiss before he pulled his shirt off. “We should probably put on real people clothes if we’re actually leaving the apartment.” Amy watched as Jake pulled on one of his button downs. “Ames?”

“Yeah, sorry,” Amy said and pulled off her own sweatshirt and grinned as Jake watched her strip only to put on different clothes. “You do the same thing!” Amy accused him, and Jake just smiled in response. 

As they walked to the restaurant, Amy started to notice that Jake seemed to have a lot of energy he didn’t know what to do with. “What’s up?” Amy asked, hoping he’d get the gist of what she was trying to say.

“We haven’t gone on a date in ages,” Jake said and smiled at her. He squeezed her hand before he pulled their intertwined hands up to kiss the back of hers. “I missed going on dates with you.” 

Amy smiled at him. “So are you nervous or excited right now?”

“Both,” Jake said. “I’m not worried about anything, I know there’s nothing to worry about, but something about how long it’s been makes me antsy.” 

“Everything makes you antsy,” Amy said. “You have more energy than you know what to do with.”

“It’s a talent,” Jake said.

“It’s really not,” Amy said. “I’m nervous and excited too.” Jake glanced at her and gave her a warm smile, Amy couldn’t help but think of the first smile he gave her when she woke up with no memories of him. “Can we talk a little bit about what we were talking about before?” 

“Which part?”

“When I woke up,” Amy started, “and I didn’t remember you or the nine-nine, you know I was scared and confused and a little angry. But how were you feeling at that time? I know you were scared as well, but a different kind of scared.”

“Okay,” Jake said slowly, “so you wanna make a date that, for some unknown reason we are uncomfortable about, even more uncomfortable.”

“Mask the uncomfortable we don’t understand with uncomfortable that we kind of understand.”

“That sounds like something I would say,” Jake said. “I really am rubbing off on you in a bad way.”

“Answer the question, Jake.”

“I was scared,” Jake said. “As you said, I was scared and I was nervous. You know that I was terrified that you were going to leave me, and that I wasn’t going to stop you.” Jake’s explanation stopped when they entered the restaurant. He told the host it was the two of them, and gave his last name, their last name, when the host asked and told them it would be a fifteen minute wait. They both walked back outside to wait for their table, Jake stayed silent until Amy nudged him a little.

“Continue,” Amy said.

Jake shrugged before he turned to look at Amy. “I was so relieved to see you awake, and then when you didn’t seem to know who I was, it was like my world fell apart. Are you sure you’re not just trying to get me to talk about emotions? Emotions are hard, Amy!”

“They are,” Amy agreed. “If you don’t want to talk about it, you don’t have to.”

“Not right now,” Jake said, but smiled at her so that she knew he wasn’t trying to stop the conversation altogether. “Did you want to talk about it?”

Amy paused, and before she could speak, she heard someone call out, “Peralta?” Amy automatically responded to the name, and she wasn’t sure if it was because she was standing next to Jake, or if it was because she had learned to respond to the name even on her own. Either way, she didn’t think it bothered her, a month ago it would have, but now it felt like the norm. Amy smiled to herself, she felt that she had grown a lot in the past few months, and she thought Jake had as well. They had gone through a lot of bumps in their relationship, but they stuck through it together every single time, even if they weren’t physically anywhere near each other. 

“I thought you were cute,” Amy said as they sat down.

“What?”

“When I first woke up, I felt your hand in mind and it felt nice, but I didn’t think I knew who you were, so I pulled away. But the first thought I had about you was that I thought you were cute and I liked the way you smiled at me.”

“See,” Jake grinned, and Amy knew she was never going to hear the end of it. “Right from the beginning you knew I was irresistible. I knew it, I knew no matter what you would always want a piece of this.” He gestured broadly at his body and Amy glared at him.

“No you didn’t, otherwise you wouldn’t have been such a basket-case for weeks.” 

Jake grabbed her hand and rubbed his thumb against her knuckles, like he was doing in the hospital when she first woke up. The way he was looking at her reminded her of the photo that was on the table back in their apartment, the one where she’s looking at the camera, but he’s looking at her. Amy knew that he didn’t really like that photo, but she loved it, because sometimes it was still hard to get Jake to express his emotions, but it was pictures like that that showed very clearly just how much he loved her, and how he put his emotions into actions instead of words, and sometimes those actions were small, sometimes it was just holding her hand. 

“I love you,” Jake said, quietly, privately, even though they were in a public place surrounded by people.

“I love you too,” Amy said and watched Jake’s smile, and how the emotion showed clearly on his face. “I told you before that you scared me.” Jake frowned, but Amy continued. “I told you how knowing how you felt about me was overwhelming because I wasn’t sure how I felt about you. And I’ve already told you that I was stupid for not realizing it sooner. I’m glad we’re calling this a date night, because things were finally starting to feel normal, and I feel like tonight was what I needed to cement that. That everything is going to be okay, that everything will go back to normal, including date nights with you that will either end with us watching some dumb movie on the couch in our pyjamas or…” Amy let herself trail off, and Jake grinned at her.

“Nope,” Jake said, “you still can’t resist all this.”

“You mean your obnoxious need to gloat all the time?” Amy asked, ignoring what he was insinuating. 

“Yup,” Jake said. “Exactly that, you love it when I’m obnoxious.”

“I guess I have to, because you’re always obnoxious.” 

“The word ‘obnoxious’ has been said too many times and is no longer a word,” Jake said. “It can never be used again.”

Amy was about to come up with a smartass retort when their waiter walked up to them. When they had gotten their meals, Amy couldn’t help herself.

“Do you think you could have made this better?” Amy asked.

“Homemade stuff is always better because it’s homemade,” Jake said. “But I’m not a professional. And shush, what if someone we know is here and you let out my biggest secret.”

“Didn’t you make something for one of Nikolaj’s birthdays?”

“Yeah, Charles wanted something specific, but I couldn’t find it anywhere, so I just made it and told him I bought it. If you tell him that, this relationship is over.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Which part?”

“There is no way you are ever going to even try to divorce me.”

“That is true,” Jake said. “But the point still stands.”

“Sooner or later someone is going to find out.”

“Yeah, you did,” Jake said. “And that was only when we started living together and I couldn’t hide it. So the only way anyone will ever know is if one of us tells them, and I am taking this secret to my grave.” 

“You know,” Amy said, “if we have kids, children aren’t good at keeping secrets like that. People will find out, and you will be making all of the birthday cakes because I could never.”

Jake was staring at her with one eyebrow quirked up, a mild questioning look on his face.

“Sorry,” Amy said. “I don’t know why I said that. We never talked about kids did we?” 

“Not really,” Jake said. “Usually Boyle is the one talking about us having kids.”

“He is,” Amy said slowly.

“Do you…” Jake said slowly, “do you want to talk about it?”

“No,” Amy said a little too quickly. “I mean, not here, not right now. But yes, I do, eventually.” 

“You do eventually want to talk about it or eventually have kids?”

“Jake.”

“Okay, okay,” Jake held up his hands in surrender and looked back at his dinner. “I could try to make this one day if you wanted me to.”

“Does it look like it would be hard?”

“You’re just trying to find a meal I can’t make, aren’t you?” Jake asked. “You thought that I was a bad cook, just like you, because I never used to eat well, and instead of being pleasantly surprised that your boyfriend-slash-husband can cook, it annoyed you that there was just one more thing I was better than you at.” 

“Seriously,” Amy said, “how and when did you learn to be this good?” Jake shrugged and took a bite of food that was too big for his mouth, which really was a feat for him. “You are disgusting.”

“It’s too late,” Jake said, “you’re already married to me.”

For a moment Amy was tempted to say that that could change, but she felt it was probably too soon for a joke like that, so she settled for just smiling at him. 

 

The walk back to their apartment was quieter than the walk to the restaurant. Jake had slung his arm around Amy’s waist and she leaned in to him a little as they walked. It was a pleasant silence, and Amy could feel it every time Jake inhaled and exhaled. 

“So,” Jake said as they got close to their apartment building. “You said date night would end one of two ways, which ending would you prefer right now, babe?”

“Pyjamas and movie,” Amy said.

“Your wish is my command,” Jake replied as he opened the door to their building. He groaned as Amy marched him towards the stairs, she knew he didn’t really mind too much, but he liked complaining about it as much as possible. “Every time, Ames, why? Every time.” Jake shifted so his arm wasn’t around her anymore and he reached for her hand, on impulse, she grabbed his hand and pulled him after her.

Amy had made it to the couch before Jake, and sprawled over the entire thing. 

“Hey, Ames?” Jake asked as he entered the room. “Come here a sec?”

Amy groaned as she got up and walked over to him. “What is it?”

Jake sidestepped around her and hurtled the back of the couch so he landed on the couch, sprawled over the entire thing, like Amy just was seconds ago. “And the couch is mine!”

“Hey!” Amy said and marched over to him. She started nudging him, but he kept pushing her arms away so she couldn’t push him off the couch. “You are bad at sharing.”

“Yes I am,” Jake said as he scrolled through netflix before putting on some action movie.

“Hey Jake?”

“M-hm?” Jake looked up at her. Amy crawled over him and Jake smiled up at her, she settled on top of him with her head on his chest and her hands at his sides. Immediately, Jake’s arms came around her, one hand settled on her back, the other one tangled in her hair. Ignoring the movie, Amy listened to Jake’s steady heartbeat and relaxed to the feeling of him tracing aimless patterns on her back. 


	15. Let's Talk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I did not know that this was where this story was going, and yet here we are... enjoy!

**Jake**

 

It didn’t take long for Amy to fall asleep, it never does. Jake ignored the rest of the movie, the explosions and yelling happened so often that he could just ignore it. Instead, he listened to Amy breathing and enjoyed the feeling of her weight on him and her hands on his sides. When the movie ended, Jake turned everything off and let himself lay on the couch for a moment in the dark, relaxed.

“Hey, Ames,” Jake said and shook her shoulder a little. “We should go to sleep.”

“Okay,” Amy mumbled against him. “Does this go on the good date list?”

“Any date with you goes on the good date list no matter what.”

“Good,” Amy said as she stood up and held out her hand to help Jake up. 

They walked through the apartment with limited sight, and working mostly on muscle memory. When they got to the bed, Jake let himself fall down on top of it and felt Amy do the same next to him. He crawled under the covers and pulled Amy close to him.

Jake fell asleep in record time.

 

The next few weeks seemed to get easier and easier, to the point where everything was normal, it was almost as if Amy had never lost her memories. Every once in a while there was something that was difficult for her to recall, but more often than not, she remembered. Work had gone back to normal as well, Amy stopped visiting as much, but she still visited him sometimes, usually only when they agreed to time their lunches together, as long as nothing came up for either of them.

Jake was sitting at his desk waiting for Amy to come up so they could go out to lunch, he had just closed a case and had already finished the paperwork for it, so he didn’t want to start something new when he knew he was about to go eat. Amy was always on time, she was consistent like that, so Jake started to worry a little when he glanced at the clock and saw that she was five minutes late. He knew he had no reason to worry, not really, but it was Amy, so he did anyway. 

“Jakey,” Charles called from his desk, “aren’t you going to lunch with Amy today?”

“Yeah,” Jake said. “She was supposed to come up here when she was ready to go.”

“Ooh, where are you going?” Charles asked. “If you’re not sure, there’s this great new place around the corner—”

“Nope,” Jake said before Charles could try to tell him what the place had. “I’m sure it’s great, Charles, but we kinda had a plan already.” They did not have a plan already, but letting Charles pick where they had lunch would always be a bad idea. 

Lucky for Jake, the elevator doors opened an Amy stepped out. Jake got up quickly before Charles could try to convince them to go to this new restaurant that probably served something revolting he would insist that they try. 

“Hey,” Jake said, smiling. “Ready to go?”

Amy glanced around the bullpen, not really focusing on anything until she saw Holt’s door, which was closed with the blinds down. 

“Ames?”

“What?” Amy asked and looked at Jake as if she just realized that he was there. “I’m sorry, I got distracted.”

“You just got off the elevator, distracted by what?”

“Nothing,” Amy said.

“Are you leaving me for Holt? I knew this day would come, you have an unhealthy obsession with him, Amy.”

“Shut up, Jake,” Amy glared at Jake, but he continued to smile at her.

“Are you ready to go to lunch?” Jake repeated his question.

“Yes,” Amy said, but she hesitated before she got back on the elevator with Jake. Usually by now Amy would start telling him what she had done so far, some boring paperwork that she was really excited about but would make Jake want to throw himself off the roof. Instead, Amy stayed silent, and frowned at their reflections in the elevator doors, their faces distorted by the metal. 

Jake kept trying to start up some kind of conversation, he told her about the case he had just finished, and how there were literal puzzle pieces left at the scenes, something Amy would usually jump on, but she only responded with one word answers. 

After they had ordered their food, Amy still stayed mysteriously silent. “Hey,” Jake said and reached across the table to hold her hand. “What’s going on?”

Amy squeezed his hand and looked up at him. “Do you ever think about the future?”

“Yes,” Jake said, “constantly. You have a literal life calendar hanging above our bed. Honestly, it’s intimidating.”

“What if all your plans for the future got disrupted somehow? What would you do?”

“Well, they kind of did a few months ago,” Jake said. “Waiting for you to love me again was not an easy thing to live through.”

Amy squeezed his hand again and smiled at him. “I love you so much,” Amy said. “I really should have noticed that earlier than I did this time around.”

“I think you did,” Jake said. “And that was what scared you, because you couldn’t remember how you got those feelings.”

“I should have trusted them, I should have trusted you,” Amy said. “You know that I trust you, right?”

“I don’t think we would have made it this far without trusting each other,” Jake said, “even if you forget everything about our relationship, if we hadn’t trusted each other as detectives, working together would have been a lot more difficult.”

“You’re right,” Amy said. Just then, the waiter appeared with their food, which distracted Jake enough from the conversation. It wasn’t until they were leaving the restaurant that Jake realized they never really finished their conversation. 

“Hey,” Jake said, “so where were you going with all that future stuff, what happened?”

“Something happened and I’m worried that because of it I won’t be able to become a captain until much later than my projected date for it.”

“Oh,” Jake said. “But you’re awesome and you can do anything you set your mind to. I know you can, I’ve seen it in action. Whatever it is, you can push past it. Was is it a case or something?”

“Something,” Amy said slowly. “I’ll finish telling you later, I promise.” Amy and Jake entered the precinct, and Amy walked away before Jake could say anything else. He stood in the middle of the doorway, looking like an idiot, staring after where Amy had disappeared to. 

In the elevator up to his floor, Jake’s mind was reeling, trying to think of something that would make Amy worried about not becoming a captain in time. Impossible situation after impossible situation occurred to Jake. When he got to the bullpen, Jake made a beeline for Charles’ desk and almost physically pulled Charles from his seat.

“I need to talk to you,” Jake mumbled and beckoned Charles to follow him. For a solid minute, Jake paced the small area of the evidence room and Charles watched him walk back and forth.

“Did you go to the place I was telling you about?” Charles asked, and then continued to talk about some horrible food, Jake thought he caught the words “pickled and deep fried octopus” and decided to stop Charles there.

“No,” Jake said. “That sounds awful. I’m going to tell you something and you can’t freak out and you can’t say anything because I don’t know for sure, but I’m freaking out. Okay? So it is my turn to freak out and you have to be calm so I can be calm. Can you do that for me, Boyle?”

“Yes, Jake, anything. What’s wrong?”

“As I said, I want you to have no reaction, because this is speculation, and speculation only. It started with Amy acting weird, and then her telling me that she’s worried she won’t be able to make captain by the time she wants to, which is crazy because Amy is amazing and can do anything. So I started thinking about why, and one possibility was zombies, she knows that the zombie apocalypse is about to happen and is trying to prepare for it. Another is aliens, she was abducted by aliens and they’ve stolen the real Amy and replaced her with a lookalike who isn’t anywhere near as good as she is. Are you following me?”

“No, not even a little bit, but continue, I’ll get there.”

Jake sighed and ran his hands through his hair. “Amy taught me this thing a while ago, Oscar’s razor or something.”

“Occam’s razor?”

“Sure, whatever,” Jake waved his hand at Charles, “not the point. It’s the thing that says the most simple solution is probably what it is. So the most simple thing I can think of, and I said don’t freak out because I don’t know, but I think Amy might be pregnant.” 

“OH MY—”

“NO, Charles!” Jake grabbed Charles by the shoulders. “I told you to stay calm, and I don’t actually know anything!”

“This is great, Jake!” Charles yelled.

“No,” Jake said, “shh, stop, stop talking!” Jake covered Boyle’s mouth and glanced at the door, hoping no one walked by or was about to walk in. “I told you, I could just be making things up, I don’t know. All I know is that Amy is acting weird and that’s the first actual logical thing I could think of. Tell me I’m crazy, tell me I’m imagining things.”

“Do you want her to be pregnant?”

“I don’t know!” Jake leaned against the table and sighed. “I just think we’ve gone through a lot of emotional stress lately, and a baby is not going to help that. But I don’t even know if that’s what it is, so let’s not jump to conclusions, what else could be happening that would make Amy act weird.”

“Why don’t you just talk to her, Jake?” Charles asked, and Jake glared at him, knowing that Charles was being the voice of reason right now.

“She said she would talk to me about it later, and I don’t want to push it,” Jake said.

“So then you shouldn’t worry about it now.” Jake nodded absentmindedly, and he missed the growing excitement on Charles’ face. “But, Jake,” Charles started and Jake sighed, he knew what was coming. “It’s about time you put a baby in her! The world needs more Jake’s and a few more Amy’s wouldn’t hurt either, I guess.”

“Charles! Gross, stop,” Jake stood up and nudged Charles out of his way. “It could be nothing and I’m freaking out over nothing.”

“You want it to be a baby, don’t you?” Charles asked. Jake shrugged and crossed his arms.

“We haven’t really talked about it,” Jake said. “I mean we kinda talked about it, but we didn’t  _ really _ talk about it, you know? Raising a child is hard, and… and I’m not sure I can do it.

“Anyway,” Jake said loudly, “I just needed to verbalize that. And don’t go around telling people Amy’s pregnant, I mean it, Charles! I told you I’m speculating, and you cannot tell people about this conversation at all. I know you, and I know you can’t keep a secret, but…” Jake hesitated, knowing what he was about to say, knowing it was a bad idea, but it might be the only way to keep Charles silent. “I’ve been keeping a secret from you, and if you tell anyone about this conversation, I will never tell you what it is. If you stay silent, I’ll tell you.”

“What?” Charles almost yelled. “We don’t keep secrets, Jake! We are best friends and I tell you everything, what do you mean you haven’t told me everything? Does Amy know?”

“It’s something I just never told anyone,” Jake said. “And yes, Amy knows.”

“Why does Amy get to know?” Charles looked devastated. 

“Charles,” Jake said, “we are best friends, and I told you I’d tell you if you don’t tell anyone about this conversation. And Amy knows because I’m married to her, I live with her! It’s hard to keep secrets from people you live with.”

“That is true,” Charles said. “But I still can’t believe you’ve been keeping something from me!”

“You’ll understand when I tell you,” Jake said. “Now, let’s get back to work. And remember, don’t tell anybody.” 

“My lips are sealed,” Charles said and mimed locking his mouth with a key. Jake sighed and shook his head at his best friend, but didn’t comment as they walked out of the evidence room. Maybe talking to Charles was a mistake, but saying out loud what he was thinking helped Jake process things. He knew he was probably jumping to conclusions, but it was a conclusion that made sense and that was what scared him.

 

The walk home with Amy was even more tense than their lunch outing, because this time, Jake wasn’t saying anything either. He knew that the second he opened his mouth, he would say what he was thinking, and the streets of Brooklyn was not the place to have this conversation. 

“You’ve been overthinking it, haven’t you?” Amy asked as soon as they walked into the apartment building. Jake nodded, but still didn’t say anything, he wanted to wait until they were actually home.

They walked through the door and Jake tugged off his tie, part of his ritual of coming home, of leaving work behind.

“I don’t know how to tell you this,” Amy said. “I don’t know how you’re going to react.”

“We’ve had a lot of those moments recently, haven’t we?” Jake asked. And then he couldn’t help it, his mouth moved before his mind could catch up. “Are you pregnant?”

Amy went wide-eyed and stared at Jake, and he stuffed his hands in his pockets and shifted his weight back and forth.

“I don’t know,” Amy whispered. “I’m late, and it could be nothing, and we haven’t really talked about it, and it’s so much earlier than I wanted it to be. What if we have a baby and then I can’t become a captain? How will that impact our lives? And I just… I wasn’t sure how to tell you, I wasn’t sure how you’d react. That’s why I was late meeting you for lunch.” Amy pulled a small box out of her purse. “I had already left the precinct, because I was buying this, but I couldn’t do it. I needed to talk to you about it first, I needed you to help me.”

Jake hesitated, and he knew Amy noticed. “I don’t…” Jake started, “How do I help you with this?”

“Talk to me,” Amy said. “You’ve been my support through so much, and I need your support with this too. We’re going to have to support each other.”

“Okay,” Jake said. “Okay, I can do that. We can do that. Let’s start by staying calm.”

“You don’t sound very calm, Jake,” Amy said, but she smiled at him, and that instantly made Jake feel better.

“Nope,” Jake said, “I’m calm, I’m calm. So first thing’s first is you need to take that test and then we’ll kinda know for certain. But you’re worried that it’ll impact you becoming a captain. It won’t. I don’t think it will anyway, I told you before you became a sergeant that you’re gonna be awesome and that you can do this. It’s just going to make it even more amazing that you became a captain all while raising a kid as well.”

“Thank you,” Amy said and stepped forward. The feeling of Amy’s arms around him made Jake feel so much better. With Amy there, he would make it through any situation, he knew it. “You’re worried about becoming your dad, aren’t you?”

Fear spiked through Jake, he let it wash over him and then let it subside, he hugged Amy tighter. “I don’t know how to be a dad, I didn’t really have one. Well, I had one, but a real shit one. What if I’m a real shit dad, too? Oh god, Amy, my dad left my mom, I don’t want to leave you, but what if I become just like him? I’m not a good role model, I eat gummy bears for breakfast, kids can’t eat gummy bears for breakfast, can they?”

“Jake,” Amy said. “You’re spiraling.”

“Sorry,” Jake said. “All I can see is me leaving you because I’m a shit dad and that slowly leads to me becoming a crooked cop, oh my god, Amy, I’m going to go back to prison! I don’t want to go back to prison!”

“Jake!” Amy pulled away from him and grabbed his arms. “You are still spiraling, snap out of it!”

“Sorry,” Jake said, “sorry.”

“You are not going to be your father,” Amy said. “I’m pretty sure you’d rather jump in front of a bus than leave me.”

“True,” Jake said, “and the way Gina talked about it when she got hit by a bus made it seem so cool.”

“Focus,” Amy said. “I think that one day, you will be a great dad. I don’t think anybody knows what they’re doing when they first become parents, everybody has to learn. And we know we have the nine-nine to help us no matter what.”

“True.”

“Okay,” Amy said. “Okay, so I think we got past our biggest fears here.” Amy started talking with her “I have a plan and I’m going to follow it meticulously step by step” voice, and Jake found himself smiling at her and feeling a bit like he did when he realized that this was the love of his life and he had to ask her to marry him. “So, I’m going to take this test, and then we have to wait for the results, we’ve waited all day to even have this conversation, we can wait a few minutes for results. And then depending on what it says we’re going to talk about it. Either way, we are going to talk about the possibility of kids. The difference will be whether we’re talking about the near future or the possible future.”

“Hey, Ames,” Jake said. “I know you’re going through your process here or whatever, but…”

“Right,” Amy said. “Right.” She walked into the bathroom and Jake went through the motions of what he would normally do when they got home together. After toeing off his shoes, Jake walked into the kitchen and stared into the fridge to try and mentally plan what to make for dinner. Without really looking, Jake pulled out chicken and a frying pan and tried to make something relatively edible. 

After a few minutes, Amy came into the kitchen, Jake raised his eyebrows in question.

“I left it in there,” Amy said. “I couldn’t stare at it and wait, I have to do something.” 

“Can you grab the garlic powder?” Jake asked, saying the first thing he could think of that Amy could do. When Jake had finished making dinner for them, he realized that Amy still hadn’t gone back to see what the test said. “Do you want to eat first?”

Amy nodded and grabbed utensils before she walked over to the table, while Jake carried the plates over. 

“I can’t sit in silence,” Jake said. “We don’t have to talk about it right now, but I can’t do the silence.”

“You never can,” Amy said. “You always have to have a comment about everything.”

“Yes!” Jake said, “I do. Work has gotten much easier for you now, hasn’t it? You remember everything, basically.”

“Yeah,” Amy jumped on the topic and started talking about the changes she had made to make her uniformed officers more efficient. Jake smiled at her and relaxed to the sound of her voice, he was sure that the uniformed officers found Amy annoying, with her need to stay by the books. He was also sure that they liked her anyway, because Amy was weird about paperwork and following the rules, but she a great person to be around. There was the possibility that he was bias, though. 

“What about you?” Amy asked.

“Oh,” Jake said and launched into a story about a triple homicide that he and Rosa had solved, sparing no detail. Any normal person would have been grossed out or disturbed by Jake’s enthusiasm while describing, in complete detail and reenacting a triple homicide, but Amy just kept asking him questions about it. “You’re stalling, now,” Jake said, smiling.

“Whatever it says,” Amy said as she stood up, “we’re a team and we’re in this together.”

“One hundred percent,” Jake said and followed her to the bathroom, he stopped at the door while she walked up to the counter. For a moment, Amy was just staring at it and Jake started to fidget. “What does it say, Ames?” Jake leaned forward, not sure what he wanted it to say.

Amy looked up, smiling, “I’m pregnant, Jake.”

The whole world froze to Jake, he wasn’t sure if he should be happy or scared or if being somewhere in between was acceptable. “What?” was all he could think to say.

“It’s positive,” Amy said, she picked up the test and showed him the little plus sign on it. “We’re going to have a baby.”

“We’re going to have a baby,” Jake said back to her, and then it really hit him. He had married the love of his life and he was starting a family with her. “We’re going to have a baby!” Jake threw his arms around Amy while she laughed at his reaction. “Okay, okay, what do we do now? Do we tell people? How do we do this? We have to get stuff for the baby, what kind of stuff do parents need to get for babies?”

“Jake,” Amy said. “You are really not having a good day, you keep spiraling.”

“No, Ames,” Jake said and kissed her. “I’m having a great day and I don’t know how to handle it. Oh no.”

“‘Oh no?’ Why ‘oh no?’” Amy asked.

“I told Charles,” Jake said, and Amy frowned at him. “When you were acting weird after lunch, I kind of guessed what it was, and I talked to Charles because I didn’t know what else to do. Essentially, I told Charles already. Although, I also told him to keep it secret because I didn’t really know then.”

“You know the whole precinct is going to know by tomorrow,” Amy said.

“Maybe not,” Jake said. “I may have kind of threatened him.”

“What did you do?”

“I told him I’ve been keeping a secret from him and I’d tell him if he didn’t tell anybody what we talked about.”

“A secret?”

“If he doesn’t tell anybody, I’m going to tell him I can actually cook.”

Amy laughed. “To most people that wouldn’t be a big deal, to Charles this might be the worst thing you’ve ever kept from him.”

“I know,” Jake said and smiled. “But I was thinking that if we really did have a kid, what you said about the kid not being able to keep that secret? Yeah, he would find out eventually.”

“You know you need to lie to Charles now, though,” Amy said. “You can’t tell him the truth that I actually am pregnant, because he really won’t be able to contain himself.”

“No,” Jake said sarcastically, “He’s only been trying to convince us to have a kid since we got into a relationship. Oh, and he only pestered us to get into a relationship since we first met. You think he won’t be able to contain himself?”

Amy glared at Jake, he smiled back.

“What do you suggest I tell him?” Jake asked.

“Tell him that I was worried about my memory loss affecting my leadership as sergeant and that I thought that had set me back from becoming a captain.”

“You are the worst,” Jake said, “do you know that?”

“Yes,” Amy said and started to walk over to the couch. “And now we really do need to have a conversation. First of all, no we don’t tell anyone right now, the chances of miscarriages are so high in the first trimester, I don’t want to have to un-tell people.”

“How do you know that?”

“I looked it up.”

“When?”

“Today,” Amy said, matter-of-factly. “When we got back from lunch. I kept thinking about it and I had to do something about it.”

“Did you start a binder?”

“No,” Amy said and then jumped up from the couch. “I didn’t want to start one in case I wasn’t actually pregnant, but now… I think I have a blank one somewhere.” 

Jake watched, amused, as Amy dug through their closet and pulled out and old binder and tried to sort old tabs into it. When she started muttering to herself, Jake thought it might be time to intervene. “Okay,” Jake said, taking the binder from her, “I know you’re going to make a binder, and it’s gonna be awesome and plan out everything, but right now, I thought we were going to talk.”

“Right,” Amy said and stared wistfully at the binder before she sat down next to Jake. “First thing’s first, we are not naming our child after a Die Hard character, or any reference to Die Hard, either.”

“What? Ames, come on, Die Hard has the best characters and it would be awesome,” Jake said.

“I’m not budging on this,” Amy said.

Jake sighed dramatically, “Fine, no Die Hard names. No ‘meaningful historical’ names either.” Jake saw Amy’s face drop a little. “Come on, Amy, we don’t want our kid teased mercilessly because they’re named after some dead guy that did some important thing that nobody cares about anymore.” 

“Fine,” Amy said. “We’ll talk names more later. Second, we tell no one, not yet. Although,” Amy paused for a moment, “I think we can tell our parents and leave it at that for now.” 

“My mom is going to be so excited,” Jake said. “My dad will act like he cares for my mom’s sake, but he won’t. Your mom is going to be excited as well, and I’m not sure if your dad will hate me more or less.”

“He doesn’t hate you,” Amy said.

“Okay,” Jake said, “but I’m not sure he likes me, either. He still terrifies me, some of your brothers, too.”

“They’re all harmless.”

“Really? Because at least one of them, don’t know which one because it was before I learned their names, threatened me with a knife if I ever broke your heart.”

“That’s fine,” Amy said casually, Jake was about to protest, but she talked over him. “If anything, I’m much more likely to break your heart.”

“I know you’re joking,” Jake said, “but it still feels a little sore after the past few months.”

Amy leaned forward and kissed him. “Although,” Amy pulled away. “We won’t know with absolute certainty that I’m pregnant until I go see a doctor and get tested there. Should I make a doctor’s appointment now? Can I even make one now?”

“I doubt it,” Jake said. “It’s almost nine at night. You can do that in the morning.”

Amy nodded. “Jake?”

“Yeah?”

“I know you want to talk about it, and I do too,” Amy said, and stood up, “but I have to do that binder.”

Jake laughed as Amy walked away, she pulled out her laptop and seemed to immediately start researching. He knew that this was a process that Amy needed to do by herself, but when she was done, he wanted to be involved in as much of it as he could. 


	16. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long to get out. I'm still not really satisfied with this chapter, something about it seems off to me, but I think I've reached the point where I have to just end this story. I hope you enjoy!

**Amy**

 

Amy knew that being pregnant was not going to be an easy thing to do, but she had been through so much in her life already, that pregnancy didn’t seem like it was going to be that much of a hassle. Although, she had hoped that when she did get pregnant, it would be planned and it would be with the love of her life. One out of two isn’t that bad, she figured. 

Jake had always been amazing, when they were partners, to when they were dating, to when they were married, and even through when she had forgotten who he was. So it didn’t come as a surprise to her that Jake was amazing at being there for her while she was pregnant. Every little thing he did, even though he was worried he would be a terrible father, even if he messed up, he tried so hard for her. He had been trying to be a better person ever since Holt became their captain, and even more so after they started dating. Amy knew he was always a good person, but he needed to grow up, and in the past few years, he definitely did. 

“Are you comfortable? Are you okay? What can I do?” Jake asked, fussing over her. 

“I’m pregnant, not an invalid,” Amy said, but the statement was destroyed when she gasped in pain. 

“No,” Jake said, “you  _ were _ just pregnant and not an invalid, now you’re in labour and I don’t know what to do to help.”

Amy was pacing up and down the hospital hallway using Jake for support because the nurse had said that walking might help. Amy wasn’t completely sure what aspect of this walking would help with, but at this point she really didn’t want to be there anymore.

“I want to go home,” Amy said.

“I don’t think that’s an option anymore, babe,” Jake said, a slight smile on his face.

“No,” Amy said, “I don’t want to do this anymore, I want to go home.”

“And going home will help, how?”

“I don’t know!” Amy gripped at Jake’s arm and he wrapped the other one around her to support her. 

“Let’s walk back to the room,” Jake said and guided Amy to turn around.

The slow walk back to the room Amy was in seemed to take forever even though they only walked a little bit down the hall. Amy was sweaty and she was sure she looked awful, but Jake kept smiling at her and supporting her and telling her she was doing great. She didn’t feel like she was doing much of anything, but she couldn’t help but feel grateful to Jake and so glad that he was there. 

“Did I tell you that your parents are here?” Jake asked. “And my mom. They can’t wait to meet their grandchild.” 

“I can’t wait for this to be over,” Amy said as she grimaced. “What about your dad?” Jake shrugged as he helped Amy sit back on the bed. “Sorry,” Amy said. 

“It doesn’t matter,” Jake said and smiled at her, “because Holt is also here, and so is Charles and Rosa. They said that Gina and Terry are on their way.”

“Don’t they have other places they need to be?” Amy asked.

“Not at three in the morning, Ames.”

“How is it three in the morning?”

“Well, you see, time passes and that means that—”

“Jake,” Amy interrupted him, she was not in the mood to deal with his sarcasm. 

“Sorry, yeah, we’ve been here for a little over six hours.” 

“Isn’t that long enough?” Amy asked as she felt another contraction. “I really don’t want to do this anymore.”

“Once again, Ames, pretty sure that’s not an option at this point.” 

Amy smiled slightly and gripped Jake’s hand. The next few hours were a mess to Amy, the only thing she felt she could concentrate on was the fact that Jake was by her side the entire time. She had no idea what he was saying to her or how she responded, but his presence next to her and hearing his voice was a comfort she wasn’t expecting she would need so much. 

She was the most exhausted she had ever been when a nurse gently placed her baby, swaddled in a blanket, in her arms. “Hi,” Amy whispered to the baby. She had no idea what other babies looked like when they were just born, but she thought that her baby was beautiful. She looked up at Jake to see him smiling at the both of them, but she could also see the nerves hidden behind the smile. “Do you want to hold her?” Amy held out their baby to Jake, who seemed to hesitate. 

“I don’t know how,” Jake insisted, but Amy just looked at him. Being more careful than he probably needed to be, Jake pulled their baby into his arms and smile on his face was the best thing Amy had seen in ages. “Hello, beautiful,” Jake whispered to the baby. “You are so tiny. And what on earth are we going to name you?”

“We can figure that out later,” Amy mumbled, and the last thing she saw before she fell asleep was Jake glancing up to smile at her with their baby held gently in his arms. 

When Amy woke up, she was alone in the room except for her baby in a little crib next to her. It seemed to take all of her energy, but Amy forced herself to get up and pick up her baby, and when she lay back in the bed, she placed the baby on her chest, holding the little thing close to her. 

“Do you know you have been a pain in my ass for the past nine months?” Amy whispered to the sleeping baby. “And the past few hours were awful, but I think you were absolutely worth it.” The door opened slowly and Amy glanced up. “Jake,” she sighed.

“Hey,” Jake said softly, “you’re awake.”

“How long have I been out?”

“A few hours,” Jake said. “Pretty much everyone has gone home now.” 

“Did everyone get to meet the baby?”

“Holt did, Kevin was here, but he thought it was best to stay outside,” Jake said and Amy frowned, but didn’t push it as Jake kept talking. “Rosa did as well, but she didn’t want to hold her, I think we found something Rosa is afraid of! Charles didn’t, he was too excited and couldn’t calm down, so I kind of vetoed him coming in.”

“Probably a good call,” Amy said. 

“He was a little upset about it, but he’ll get over it,” Jake said. “Your parents are still here, they took turns holding her with my mom, who is also still here.”

Amy nodded slowly and a thought suddenly occurred to her. “You know how you told Charles you were keeping a secret from him and you would tell him if he didn’t say anything about the conversation you guys had ages ago?”

“Yeah,” Jake said and frowned, clearly trying to understand where this had come from.

“And then you extended it to not talking too much about my pregnancy?”

“Right.”

“I think your ability to hold off that conversation has now ended,” Amy said, “it’s time to tell Charles your dirty secret.”

“No,” Jake groaned and sat down in the chair next to her. He leaned forwards to kiss her and their daughter. “I guess, but right now I have other priorities.”

“And what’s that?”

“Trying to keep our respective parents from arguing over whose turn it is to hold our daughter,” Jake said, holding back a smile. “My argument is that it’s always my turn.”

“I think I agree. And maybe it’s a good thing your dad isn’t here,” Amy said tentatively, “god knows how out of hand it could get with our dads finding something to get competitive over.” 

“Yeah,” Jake said, “maybe.” He gently pushed her hair back.

 

Her stay in the hospital didn’t last that long, and the journey back to their apartment with their baby was both exciting and terrifying. Amy and Jake both struggled over if they had properly buckled her into the car, and Jake drove back to their apartment more carefully than he had ever driven in his life. They weren’t home long before there was a knock on their door.

Amy glanced around to see Jake stepping aside to let Charles in.

“You have to be quiet,” Jake was saying, “and you have to be calm. If you pass out again, and you pass out holding my daughter, I might kill you.”

“I got it, Jakey,” Charles was saying. “But I’m just so excited, you finally have a baby with Amy! You know when I told I you you’d never be a dad? I’m glad I was wrong.”

“Wait, you already apologised for that and said you didn’t mean it,” Jake said.

“Well,” Charles said, “I was starting to wonder.”

“Charles,” Jake said, exasperated, he shook his head and then gestured towards the sink. “You have to wash your hands before you can hold her.”

“Hi, Charles,” Amy said, deciding it was time to make her presence known. Jake stepped over next to her, and Amy was sure his paternal instinct had kicked in, he was already so protective over their daughter. 

“Oh my god,” Charles said, “this is perfect. Jake and Amy standing next to each other, holding their baby, I have never been happier.” 

Amy rolled her eyes as she stepped towards Charles, offering over her baby. No matter who she was passing her child over to, if it wasn’t Jake, Amy always felt the need to pull her baby back and away from them, and knowing that Charles had passed out before only made her more nervous. 

“Did you decide on a name yet?” Charles asked.

“Yeah,” Jake said. “Isabelle.” 

“Hi, Isabelle,” Charles cooed at the baby. After a few more minutes, Amy stepped forward to take her baby back, she didn’t like being apart from her for too long. 

“Hey, Charles,” Amy said. “I think Jake promised to tell you something he’s been hiding from you since you met.”

“Amy!” Jake whisper-yelled so as not to disturb Isabelle. “How could you betray me like this?”

“Oh yeah,” Charles said. “What was that?” He sounded defensive and a little hurt, and Amy took that as her queue to step back a bit, but close enough that she could still watch the encounter, she had been waiting to see this.

“It’s not really that much of a big deal,” Jake said, trying to diffuse the situation. “Really, maybe just don’t worry about it.”

“I still can’t believe you’ve been keeping something from me, Jake,” Charles said. “Best friends don’t keep things from each other.”

“You’re right,” Jake said and turned a little to glare at Amy, she stuck her tongue out at him in response. “I didn’t tell you because I don’t tell anybody and I didn’t want you to freak out, so you have to promise not to freak out.” 

“I promise,” Charles said, but Amy knew that was a promise he was about to break.

“Well,” Jake started, “ever since I was a little kid, you know, a lot of the time I had to make my own meals. You know about some of the worse things I made, like gummies rolled up into a fruit roll up burrito.” Charles nodded. “But that was mainly just because I was lazy and didn’t feel like putting in the effort. I’m actually a really good cook, I can make just about anything. You remember that weird thing you wanted me to get for Nikolaj’s birthday a while back? Yeah, I couldn’t find it anywhere so I just made it, and I made up the place I told you I bought it from.” 

For a moment Charles was silent. “You can… I mean… you made… WHAT?!” Charles started yelling nonsensical words at Jake, which caused Jake to try and shush him, but it was too late, Isabelle started crying and Amy quickly retreated into the nursery and shut the door, trying to keep out the noise of Charles yelling at Jake, something about this being the kind of thing you don’t keep from friends. She could still hear Charles making a commotion and Jake trying to quietly defend himself, but it was muffled enough that she got Isabelle to calm back down. After a few more minutes, it got quiet outside, so Amy placed her sleeping daughter in her crib and ventured outside. 

Charles was sitting on one end of the sofa looking distraught, while Jake was sitting on the other, looking mildly amused. “I can’t believe you kept this from me,” Charles was saying as Amy approached. 

“It just isn’t something I bring up,” Jake said, “and when I realised that you were that into food, it just seemed like a bad idea to tell you, because were weren’t really friends yet. And then you know, I just never brought it up.”

“This changes everything!” Charles almost yelled and Amy shushed him. 

“This changes nothing,” Jake insisted. “I am not making anything for you or anyone else on demand.”

“You make things for me on demand,” Amy said, knowing she was making the situation worse, but she was enjoying watching Jake scramble. 

“Amy,” Jake said as a warning. 

“You make things for her,” Charles said accusingly. 

“‘Her,’” Jake said. “As in my wife? Yeah, have you ever eaten anything she’s made? No, offence, Ames, I love you so much. But we would be dead if we ate her home cooked meals. Nah, I make everything.”

“That’s true,” Charles conceded. 

“Hey,” Amy said, defensively, but she knew it was Jake’s payback for her own comment. “I’m not that bad.”

“Even Scully wouldn’t eat your turkey on thanksgiving,” Jake said.

“Yeah,” Amy said. “I guess.”

“So why tell me now if you clearly didn’t want to tell me,” Charles said, still a little defensive.

“Because when my kid gets older, she’s not going to know that she has to hide the fact that daddy makes dinner every night and that it’s actually good and not a mess,” Jake said. Amy couldn’t help but smile at how easily Jake had referred to himself as a father. 

“Oh my god,” Charles said. “Jake, you’re a dad!”

Suddenly Amy realised Jake’s tactic, distract Charles with the fact that they were parents now. From a glance at Jake, she could also tell that he was warning her not to bring the conversation back, so she let it drop, knowing it would probably come up again.

It didn’t take long after that for Charles to leave, all Amy had to do was say she was tired and that she needed to feed her daughter, both of which were not true, but she was afraid that Charles was going to wake Isabelle up. 

“That didn’t go so badly,” Amy said after Charles had left.

“Yeah,” Jake said, “no thanks to you.”

“You know it’s going to come up again,” Amy said.

“Yeah,” Jake sighed, “I know, hopefully he’s over it by that time. He told me this was the worst betrayal he had ever experienced.”

“His ex-wife divorced him and then manipulated him for years,” Amy said.

“And yet here we are,” Jake said. “Is Isabelle asleep?”

“Yeah,” Amy said. “I’m surprised you haven’t nicknamed her yet.”

“Oh, I have,” Jake said, smirking, “in my head I call her ‘Iz,’ but I figured you’d want to use her full name for a while.”

“I like Iz,” Amy said and wrapped her arms around Jake, he immediately held her closer and she melted into him. “I love you so much.”

“I love you so much too,” Jake said. 

“You know,” Amy started, “when I had lost my memories, there was a time that I thought for certain I was going to divorce you.”

“Thanks,” Jake said sarcastically, but Amy could hear the hurt underneath it and feel how he pulled her tighter against him.

“I don’t know how I ever thought that,” Amy said. “I think it was really that I was scared, but if I had acted on a whim and done that, I wouldn’t have ever been as happy as I am now.”

“I love you,” Jake whispered into her hair. “I will always love you.” 

“And I’ll always love you.”

For a moment, Amy felt blissful peace, and then she heard cries coming from the other room. Jake was quicker to respond and by the time Amy made it to the doorway, Jake had already picked up Isabelle and was rocking her gently in his arms. She leaned against the doorframe and smiled at her husband holding their daughter, and she couldn’t imagine her life going any other way. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another reason why this took so long was because I wrote a completely different chapter in Jake's POV, but I ended up scrapping it because it didn't feel as much like an ending as this did. Let me know if you guys want to read that though, because I still have it, I just feel that it doesn't make as much sense for the story.


End file.
